


Tales from the Dark End of the Street

by lackofpatience



Series: The Lion and the Thorn [4]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Cervical Sex, Chess, Cunnilingus, Drinking, F/M, First Time, Flashbacks, Flashforwards, Gaslighting, Infidelity, Letters, Lies of Omission, Loss of Virginity, PTSD, PWP, Rape Roleplay, Rape/Non-con Elements, So much talking, Sparring, Umberto Eco, blowjob, dog POV, mindgames, ngl this one got a little dark, people who don't know how to talk about feelings needing to talk about feelings, tiny bit of bi!Cullen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-01-11
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 05:24:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 54,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5696608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lackofpatience/pseuds/lackofpatience
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Hiding in shadows where we don't belong</i>
  <br/>
  <i>Living in darkness, to hide our wrong</i>
</p><p>A commander, a warden, and the various innocents caught in their wake.</p><p>  <i>I know time is gonna take its toll</i><br/><i>We have to pay for the love we stole</i></p><p>The ongoing saga of a secret affair between Cullen and Surana, set after the end of DA:I, while both are seriously involved with the Inquisitor and the King of Ferelden, respectively.  Mostly one-shots, with the occasional multi-chapter story.  Various characters, lengths, ratings, will probably play around with the timeline some.</p><p>  <i>They're gonna find us, they're gonna find us</i><br/><i>They're gonna find us, love, someday</i></p><p><b>Chapter 18:</b> Cullen and Surana share a planned evening together, but outside forces weigh heavily on the night.  <b>Rating: Explicit</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. That Song You Wouldn't Sing

**Author's Note:**

> Returned to my favourite disaster tonight to distract myself from losing Bowie. Everyone copes in their own way, right? Anyway, this will be my dumping ground for snippets of this world until I'm ready for a proper story to end everything with. Cullen/Surana will be the focus, but I want to look at the other relationships at play to an extent as well. Flashbacks, angst, sweetness, smut, whatever comes to mind. Everyone will get where they're going in the end, I swear.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen and Neria establish their new status quo. Rating: T

He agonizes over the note for hours. Writes it, rewrites it, scratches bits out before putting them back in verbatim before changing his mind entirely and scrapping the whole thing. He feeds countless pages to his candles and nearly gives up a half dozen times, decides that he’s better off just seeking her out instead of going through pointless formalities. He always sits back down. Avoiding her doesn’t feel like an option this time.

Eventually, he decides that it’s as good as it’s going to get.

Hours. To write fifteen cold, professional words. Too cold? Not professional enough? He doesn’t know anymore. He has no interest in lashing out at her for no cause again, and there’s no reason for him not to appear friendly. Is there?

Five more words, then. And a decidedly casual signature.

Better. Still missing something.

Two more words. An afterthought, but it feels necessary.

Right, then.

He folds the note over twice, seals it with wax, summons a page. A bit elaborate for a casual missive, perhaps, but far from the oddest note passed through those halls. Hardly even a curiosity, really.

It’s her second visit to Skyhold, the Inquisitor is once again abroad, and Cullen now knows better than to delay in dealing with her.

 

_Warden-Commander Surana,_

_There are matters we should discuss. I would arrange a meeting at your earliest convenience._

_I just want to talk. ( Not lie.)_

_Cullen_

 

He’s already wasted a good portion of the day, but he gets no work done until he hears back, his mind constantly wandering, time lost just staring down the doors to his office and willing them back open.

 

 

“The Hero says that she can probably make time to see you after dinner, Commander.”

 

 

For the time being, life resumes. 

 

 

*****

 

 

Cullen doesn’t understand how easy it is to forget about her. When he has to deal with her in any capacity, Neria consumes his thoughts entirely, twists him up and turns him around, confuses his senses and pushes everything else aside. And when he’s actually around her? There _is_ nothing else. 

How then can someone who affects him so strongly have so little impact on him the rest of the time?

_”Because you don’t matter.”_

If he has no reason to think of her, he simply doesn’t. It’s just that easy, to the point where he largely forgets that she’s agreed to see him until the knock comes at his office door.

“Come in,” and the words are out before he even fully remembers, but then she’s _there_ , and the illusion either shatters or begins anew. He isn’t sure which. “Neria, welcome,” he says in a rush, setting aside some requisition forms and standing to greet her, the scrape of his chair abominably loud in the small stone room. “Please, have a seat.”

The look she gives him falls somewhere between amused and unimpressed, and she mutters something under her breath that might be “Oh boy,” but she also nods and makes for the chair he keeps in the corner closest to his desk.

Cullen briefly regrets the invitation as he turns his own seat to face her and fights a wave of stubborn sentimentality, a petty little voice crying out about how that’s where Ellana sits whenever she wants to spend time with him and he can’t pull himself away from work and that _she_ shouldn’t be there, but it passes. It’s a chair, anyone can use it, and he’s being ridiculous.

“Alright, let’s have it,” Neria sighs, putting a decisive end to that pointless line of thought. Cullen freezes, covers it with a smile.

“Have what?”

“Whatever ‘yes we should, no we shouldn’t’ speech you’ve no doubt got all worked out for me, because I honestly don’t know which way the wind is blowing here,” she elaborates, and for all that she’s clearly making fun of him, there’s an undercurrent of sincerity running through it all as she leans back a bit and prompts him with a wave of her hand. “Besides, I’m sure you worked very hard on it. So have at.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” says Cullen, not sorry at all. He’s a little embarrassed at his total lack of preparation, but preparation didn’t help him any the last time he saw her, so he’s mostly just pleased to see that she’s capable of misreading him as well. Maybe he’s not as hopeless as he feels. “But there’s no speech. I really do just want to talk.”

“Oh,” she says, lips drawing forward in a fetching pout as she sits up straighter, thrown for a moment. Then the frown is gone and she nods once, slowly. “Alright, then. Talk.”

“Because it’s just that easy,” he says with a huff, after a few awkward seconds spent figuring out how to start. It earns him a small, knowing smile that he responds to in kind, relaxing a bit. “How have you been, Neria?”

“Really?” she asks with a chuckle. “That’s what you’re going with? I would have started with the weather, myself, but it’s your office. I’ve been fine, Cullen.”

He flushes at that, rubbing self-consciously at the back of his neck. “Maybe I should have worked out a speech, after all. It’s just… the last time I saw you, things seemed…”

“It was a rough night,” she cuts in with a nod of understanding, rescuing him from himself but putting him in far greater danger to do it when her smile turns coy. “You improved it substantially.”

“I… uh.” That’s it, that’s all Cullen has, which seems to absolutely _delight_ Neria, judging by the way she grins and leans forward, elbows resting against her knees. “Did I really?”

“Mm-hmm,” she knowingly hums, and of course he can’t help but remember just how she pushed him into ‘improving’ things for her, the taste of her, how she felt wrapped around his body and how nice it felt to not _care_ how wrong it was, even briefly. 

How he knows he can have it again. If he wants it.

“Neria, look-” he starts, heart heavy, but she interrupts him, dropping all that tension to hang uneasily in his gut.

“So are your hands always cold, then?”

“Excuse me?”

She reaches out before he can stop her, captures one of his hands between both of hers as she scootches her chair closer. 

All right, so he could have stopped her.

“Inkstains on your glove,” she says simply, turning his hand over. “It’s weird enough that you walk around in armour all of the time, but come on. Who writes with gloves on?” Her touch is soft enough that Cullen can barely feel it.

“They don’t actually help, but...” he begins to admit before realizing what she’s doing, seeking out any little thing to throw out and distract him, to keep him from saying what he needs to. “Hey,” he says, a little more forcefully as he stills her fingers with a grasp and brings his free hand up to rest on her wrists. When he looks up, her eyes are wide, grey pools, begging him not to speak and spoiling her otherwise carefully neutral expression. “I’m sorry.”

“Tch,” she scoffs, drawing up abruptly, taking her hands back and glancing off to the side. Shutting him out before he can do it to her. “For what? We’re just talking.”

“And that’s all. That has to be all.” It’s easier to find his voice when she’s not looking at him, he finds, and he feels a surge of resolve. He can do this. “I still want to get to know you better, be friends eve-”

“Yeah, that’s not going to work for me,” she interrupts him again, her gaze locked on some indeterminate point near the ladder up to his bed as she sits frozen, posture rigid. Not the experienced commander, but the obedient apprentice.

“Maker, why not?” he asks, an edge of desperation creeping in. He can appreciate that he’s not telling her what she wants to hear, but surely he’s not worthy of such immediate dismissal?

She sighs, losing a bit of the tension in her shoulders, but she still won’t face him, and her words are slow to come, like she has to search a long way to find each one. “Because… because what I need from you isn’t something I can get from a friend.”

His heart skips a bloody beat, and Cullen doesn’t even know why. He’s stumbled into something here, some crucial piece of understanding, and just like that, she has him. “And what is that?” Because it isn’t just sex, that much is obvious.

Finally, she turns back toward him, even if her eyes won’t meet his, her gaze instead cast somewhere around his chest. “If I ever figure it out, I promise you will be the first person I tell.” The corners of her mouth edge upwards ever so slightly, but it’s no smile.

Is it possible? That she’s been chasing some vague indefinable _understanding_ this entire time, too? That she feels it, as well? That she might see something in him that sets him apart in ways she can’t pinpoint or articulate or most of all, ignore?

_”Because you don’t matter.”_

He shakes his head, tries not to stare or look too awed by his confusion.

“But we have to sleep together for that to ever happen? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Is that what you want me to be saying?” she asks, regaining a spark of her old, flirty fire, glancing up for a split second before casting her eyes back down. “All I said is that we can’t be friends.”

Cullen doesn’t get it, but he’s finally beginning to see that she may not, either. 

“And yet you still make a point to show up when Inquisitor Lavellan isn’t around.”

She surprises him with a laugh, shockingly loud to his ears. “You are _so_ lucky I find your ridiculous vanity act endearing. Not everything is about you, Commander. I showed up when it was convenient to me to do so, it’s not my fault your girlfriend isn’t a homemaker.”

That leaves him stammering, and he’s far too relieved when she stands up, saving him the trouble of formulating a proper response. She steps over to lean against his desk right next to where he sits, and while she folds her arms across her chest in a parody of casual distance, she’s still close enough for him to feel the heat from her body.

“It’s a simple matter, Cullen. Do you want me?”

He chokes out a surprised laugh at that, shaking his head. “There is _nothing_ simple about-”

“Yes, there is. This one thing. Do you want me, yes or no.”

He risks a glance up at her, and her gaze is fiercely focused on him, catching him. Eyes like a storm, a challenge writ in her angular features, the rise and fall of her chest more noticeable than it should be. Her carefully impassive expression is an act, but it’s one she perfected years ago. Were this a chess game, he would have sealed his loss several moves back.

All that’s left is to play it out.

_I just want to talk. ( Not lie.)_

“Yes. Obviously.” He sighs, giving in. His voice turns heavy with resignation, a growl of long-repressed longing threaded through it for good measure. “I’ve wanted you since the moment I first laid eyes on you. I never stopped.”

She nods once, not breaking eye contact. “And I want you a damn sight more than I did back then.”

“I still can’t,” he says, helpless, curling his hands into fists at his sides to distract him from how easy it would be to reach out those last few inches, pull her into his lap, kiss her senseless. Make her squirm and sigh and mess his hair, ‘ridiculous vanity act’ aside. Maybe it would even warm his fingers. “I’m in love with the Inquisitor, and against all odds, she’s in love with me, too. What I _want_ is to spend the rest of my life with her. All else is immaterial. I can’t.”

If his doors weren’t unlocked, he’d probably do it. She’s _so_ close.

Fuck.

“You can. You _always_ could. The question is will you?”

He shakes his head once. Doesn’t look away. “It was wrong then, and it’s wrong now. For very different reasons, admittedly, but-”

“I’m not here to argue morals,” Neria snaps, before seeming to reconsider, bringing a hand up to rub at her temple and closing her eyes. Somehow, the frustration seems to soften her tone. “I’m not here to argue at all. Maker, this is _exactly_ what I promised myself I wouldn’t do when I got your-” She cuts herself off, and before Cullen can respond, she’s walking away and his fingers are twitching in an aborted attempt to reach out for her.

“Wait-”

She doesn’t stop until she has one hand on the door. She takes a breath, doesn’t face him again, and when she speaks, her voice is low. Tired, maybe.

“You know what I want. You know that I’m willing to take it, regardless of what else that means. And if you can say the same… you know where my room is. Same one. Otherwise… I’ll see you around, Cullen.”

And she’s gone.

This time, life doesn’t resume.

 

 

*****

 

 

He collapses onto his back, panting heavily, while Neria stretches out beside him, luxuriating like a cat in the sun as he throws an arm over his eyes and just enjoys the exhaustion. There are more candles lit this time, Cullen thinks, the atmosphere edging more towards welcoming than illicit, and he’s grateful. He lays like that for long minutes, waiting for his heart to even out even if it refuses to slow to a complete resting rate, before glancing over to catch Neria surreptitiously watching him out of the corner of her eye.

Waiting for him to make the next move. For all her confidence and talk of simple matters.

“Come here,” he murmurs, shifting to pull her against him, and her skin is scorching against his. Further intimacy won’t legitimize the union any more than running away again will. He won’t be able to spend the night, but he can at least have this. She pillows her head against his arm as he slips it around her, fitting against him far too easily, and he has to close his eyes again, overcome. Overcome with how long he’s wanted this. How long he’s wished he didn’t. How it could ruin _everything_. When he tries to speak, his whisper is suddenly hoarse. “Why can’t I say no to you?”

“Can’t answer that,” she says plainly, fingers trailing soothingly back and forth across his chest. Her next words sound more like a confession than a comfort, though. “I’m glad you didn’t, though.”

It takes everything Cullen has to tell the truth, here.

“Me, too,” he admits, turning his head to face her and draw her closer, breathe her in. She smells clean, of sweat over soap and something else, something earthy and natural that feels like it should be everywhere and somehow isn’t. Unremarkable, until he pins it down. 

Lyrium. 

She _sings_ with it. 

“Just… don’t ask me to feel the same way tomorrow morning.”

“Mmm, what about tomorrow night?” she asks, gently resting her forehead against his, long lashes brushing against her cheeks as she closes her eyes.

“That’s…” he begins. Pauses, swallows thickly, unwilling to move lest he spook himself at the prospect of committing to this. “We’ll see. How long will you be you be staying?”

“Not long. Weather allowing, I’ll be on before the week is out. But Cullen…” she hesitates, draws back a bit and moves to sit up before seeming to think better of it and relaxing in his arms again, though her hand has stilled against him, nestled in his chest hair.

“What?”

“If… And not that I’m not firmly categorizing it as ‘worth it’ this time, but if we’re going to continue with whatever this is…” Neria trails off, eyes closed again, ignoring any reaction he might make. Takes a slow breath and puts the rest of it out in a rush. “That is, if you’re going to need some kind of song and dance every time to justify it to yourself, then maybe we should… leave it at tonight. Because while I am very willing to make more terrible decisions with you, I don’t have it in me to work hard for it. I just don’t. Do… do you understand?”

For his part, Cullen doesn’t think he’s ever understood her more.

Which only means that he _can’t_ stop now.

“Same time tomorrow, then.”


	2. The Doggin' Me Around Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fifth Blight Flashback! Neria is in a mood after returning from Kinloch Hold. Dog and Alistair help. Mostly Dog. Rating: G

The Master is still upset. All night long, the rest of their pack has tried to help, but to no avail. The singing one and the rancid dwarf came closest, and the Dog has done his best, but eventually even he had to accept that he’ll accomplish the most by simply laying at her side while she sits by the fire and offering her a belly to rub whenever the mood strikes her.

She’d remained in control as ever, back in the tower that smelled like her, commanding and unafraid in the face of their enemies. But there had been something wrong even then, a scent she’d never put out before. Not fear, but… maybe pain? Or just a kind of fear he isn’t used to, and one that only got worse when they returned to camp, long after the grievances of battle should have been taken care of.

Eventually, the Master’s mate comes over to sit at her other side, and while the Dog doesn’t disturb her by moving too much, he can’t help but wag his stump of a tail a few times in excitement. If anyone can solve this, it’s the Master’s mate.

“Shit, already? Lost track of the time,” she says, rising to go before her mate puts a hand on her arm and gently pulls her back down.

“Relax. Zevran said he’d take your watch.”

The Master should have noticed the other elf’s distant movements. She’s more distracted than even the Dog realized.

“What? That’s ridiculous, I’m perfectly capable of-”

“Re. _Lax,_ ” her mate repeats, ignoring the scent of her exasperation and pulling her down to the ground again as she tries once more to rise. “Have you even slept at all?”

“I’m not tired,” she replies, smelling of dishonesty. Her every movement is exhaustion.

“Not wanting to go to sleep isn’t the same as not being tired,” he says in that annoying sing-song of his that makes the Master happy.

“Well, it is for my purposes,” she sighs, and the Dog whines his displeasure at the sentiment.

“Do you want to talk about it?” asks her mate, while the Master ignores him for a few long moments to vigorously pet the Dog’s side. It’s a rather conflicting few moments.

“I don’t know. No. Probably should, though.”

“See, that’s why you’re the smart one. I could never be nearly so self-aware.”

She gives an amused snort, and the Dog’s ears prick up at the familiar sound. “Lucky me.” She sighs again, but that not-fear smell has subsided a bit in favour of simple affection and sadness. It’s a start, at least. “It’s just… everything I can think of to say just seems so stupidly obvious, what would even be the point?”

“Hey,” her mate teases, “it’s me you’re talking to now. Never underestimate my ability to miss the obvious.”

The Master makes a sound like she’s smiling, though when the Dog looks up, she’s leaning against her mate so he can no longer see her face.

Another sigh, and this time the Dog unconsciously echoes it. “I don’t even know why this is all bothering me so much. We saved the day. It’ll all be fine, right?”

“Well, not for all the people who died,” says her mate, and the Dog doesn’t think in words but even _he_ can tell that was insensitive.

Somehow, it still earns him a chuckle. “Andraste’s ass, are you even trying to make me feel better?”

He raises his shoulders a bit and lets them fall, her body moving lightly with the motion as he puts his arm around her. “Just saying. The tower was your home, the only one you had. You’re allowed to be upset after seeing it like that.”

“But I _hated_ it there,” she protests, settling her head against his shoulder and reaching a hand over to rest possessively against his chest. They aren’t just words; she smells genuinely confused. “And we saved who we could. Why should it even matter?”

“There had to have been some small amount of good in the place, no? All those years can’t have been entirely awful, you’re not _that_ maladjusted.”

“Excuse you!” the Master replies, her shock entirely feigned as she slaps his chest. “And since when are you a Circle apologist? Traitor.”

“Ow, mercy!” calls her mate, relief coming off of him in waves. “I am no such thing, and would never dare to question the purity of your righteous hatred. Of course. But if it was _all_ bad, why end up so moody?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out!” she exclaims, but her annoyance is also an act. Her confusion has given way to a slight understanding, even if the Dog doesn’t see what it’s for. “I guess… I guess there _were_ bright spots, sure. Otherwise why bother waking up in the mornings?”

“There, see? Sometimes I _do_ know what I’m talking about,” the Master’s mate says with overbearing confidence. For some reason, the Master likes that, too. “What about that one templar? The one who went off on you?”

“There it is, I knew something had to be up if _you_ were the one trying to get me to actually talk about things like an adult,” says the Master, and just like that, she’s gone tense even if she doesn’t move away from her mate. It doesn’t match the upbeat sounds she’s making, and the Dog gives a low, unsettled growl. “You have been dying to ask me about that all day, haven’t you?”

“Well, _obviously_ ,” he fires back, apparently ignoring how her body is screaming her discomfort. The Dog butts his head up into her hand a few times in concern until she acknowledges him with a few stray, distracted pats, and settles back down. “Camp gossip is so _boring_ , always nice to spice things up with outside sources. Besides, you seemed… shaken after you saw him, and _maybe_ it was just the army of abominations we were about to face -- I’m not ruling it out -- but people yelling condemnations at you usually seems to have the opposite effect. There was nothing mutual there, I take it?”

“As if you even need to ask,” she scoffs, stretching her legs out in front of her, boots right up against the edge of the fire. “Fucking templars. And oh, he was a good little one, too.”

The air smells heavy. The Master’s mate never abides such silences long. “Buuuuuuuut?”

She sighs. “ _Buuuuuuuut…_ Cullen was different from the others. I suppose. And now he isn’t.” All three parties present react with shock when she continues and her voice breaks, suddenly and sharply trailing off. “And that sucks.” She claps a hand over her mouth at the slip, muzzling herself.

The Dog whines quietly while the Master’s mate does his level best to comfort her, but she quickly brings herself back under control. Or as close to it as she can get while still putting that rank taste of not-fear everywhere.

“It’s fine, I’m… fine. Awful shit happens every day, I don’t know why I’m being so weird about this. So the Circle found an innovative new way to destroy something special, big deal. It’s almost impressive, really.”

“We should send a card.”

She laughs at that, and it’s still all wrong, but she’s finally actively fighting the fear-feeling herself, which means it’s only a matter of time before it’s gone. The Dog knew that the Master’s mate would help.

“Right, so now what?” he brightly asks. “I’ve never made it past the part where I actually say what’s wrong when Wynne tells me to talk about my feelings, so I don’t know what comes next.”

The Master shakes her head. “Now you should probably take me to bed before I go relieve Zevran like I should. Or say any of the _really_ awful things I’m thinking.”

“Aww, I don’t even get one awful thing to tide me over? Hardly seems fair.”

“Fine. I keep thinking about how much happier I’d be right now if he’d just been dead when we got there.” She’s upright, challenging, and the Dog knows this is a good thing, even if her words aren’t. Her mate seems to know it, too.

“Oooooh. Yeah, that’s pretty bad. Let’s go,” he says in a rush, and they both get up to leave, though the Master stops to scratch behind the Dog’s ears for a nice long moment before she does. She’s still tense, still smells wrong and conflicted, but the Dog knows he won’t see either of them for the rest of the night, and she wouldn’t leave his side without intending to fix the problem.

Which means he’ll probably be _hearing_ them for most of the night.

He can always go play with the other elf in the meantime.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was a long Sunday at work today, that's the only excuse I have. Originally it was gonna be Alistair's POV, but I'd never written it before and wasn't feeling confident, so that left the Warden, but I kinda like keeping her a bit of a cipher for the time being? Thus... Dog POV. I'm sorry.


	3. Welcome Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ellana returns home. Cullen/Inquisitor, total PWP. Rating: E

_Breathe._

Cullen inhales as slowly as he can as full, missed lips press against that one spot against his hipbone that always leaves him reeling before trailing soft kisses down to the base of his cock, each punctuated by a quick, teasing flick of tongue. He lets the breath out in a rush just as Ellana exhales as well, a gentle puff of heated air against his skin, and she glances up at him, bright blue-green eyes alight with mischief and desire in equal measure as she rubs one sinfully soft cheek against his prominent stiffness. 

She hasn’t even changed out of her travel leathers yet, and her hair is still tangled from the long ride as Cullen runs his hands through it, willing his touch to be gentle, at least until she gets going. It isn’t the first time they’ve fooled around in some darkened, semi-public corner of Skyhold, but it’s the first time he’s been so turned on by the notion of how easily they could be caught that he already has trouble staying in control of himself. He’s a private man with private passions, prefers to share his love in trust and secrecy, and until now, he simply hasn’t understood the appeal inherent in jeopardizing that. It was simply a matter of convenience whenever it happened before.

What’s changed? Maybe it’s that now, he understands what _real_ risk feels like, what true fear of being caught in the act is, the knowledge of how much ruin just the wrong overheard moan could bring. This, though? Having the Inquisitor on her knees before him in the corridor just past their war room? It’s harmless. He stands to lose nothing should the worst occur, save perhaps his reputation, and he hardly deserves a good one of those, anyway. Finally, he can let himself appreciate the simple thrill of doing something illicit while hoping nobody thinks to look in their direction. It really is the little things that make life worth living.

Abruptly, Cullen stops thinking such nonsense as Ellana runs her tongue up the length of his shaft to lap teasingly at the head of his cock, taking her sweet time in spite of their surroundings, and his head falls back to rest against the cool wall behind him.

_Breathe._

Another slow inhale as her tongue deftly swirls around the tip of him, flicking against the slit, and he wills himself to keep still. If he acts as desperate for more as he suddenly is, she’ll only tease him longer. He’ll push her further only by making it absolutely necessary. It’s a game, a battle of wills between them, and a far more pleasant one than those he just finished playing with Neria, the ones that leave him all turned about and twisted up inside. It’s been barely 48 hours since the Hero of Ferelden left again, and under normal circumstances, Cullen would still be occupying that (too) brief window of all-consuming guilt, but his Inquisitor’s insistence on dragging him off immediately upon her return has ensured such thoughts are nowhere near his mind. 

Everything is exactly as it should be, and he has no room in him for any feelings but the warmth of her hand as she wraps her fingers around him, smearing saliva and precum as she goes. The warmth of her mouth as she finally slides her lips around his length, humming in satisfaction and pulling a gasp from his chest. The warmth in her eyes as she watches him and takes him as far as she comfortably can. It’s all perfect, at least until she begins to move her head and he’s reminded that perfection is a sliding scale, an ever-shifting target that she hits repeatedly.

He lets his mouth hang open, eyes falling closed in bliss as Ellana hollows her cheeks and _sucks_ , tongue moving constantly against the underside of his prick. She bobs her head to a dedicated rhythm in direct opposition to the motions of her hand, firm and steady as she strokes everything her mouth can’t cover, her lips meeting her fist with every slide and slicking him further with spit over and over again.

_Breathe._

His attempt at a slow inhale fails this time around, his breaths now coming in heavy pants that he can’t stop.

He’s good, though; he manages to keep still until she brings her free hand up to cup his balls, a slow massage completely at odds with the quick motions she maintains on his cock, at which point his hips jerk forward of their own accord and a choked noise tears itself from his throat, echoing against stone walls and bringing a blush to his cheeks. She mirrors it with one of her own, momentarily thrown, but when he manages to open his eyes halfway, she’s smirking with her mouth full and immediately sets an even more punishing pace. Her gentler touch leaves his sac, however, to trail around his thigh and come to rest against his hip, her thumb rubbing circles against his skin until he realizes she’s encouraging him to move again. 

All pretense of control he was still clinging to goes swiftly out the window at that and Cullen moans desperately as he thrusts into her wet, willing warmth, wrapping her hair around one hand and pulling just tight enough to gain control and keep from gagging her. He isn’t even leaning against the wall anymore, letting his head fall forward as he stands straight and fucks her mouth.

His climax climbs upon him quickly, it always does when she’s determined to get him off like this ( _such_ a difference from the last few times he’s come), and as his balls draw tight, she reads his body like one of her books and backs off with her mouth just enough to stick her tongue out and let that perfect pink muscle lay flat beneath his tip. Ready to receive, and if he could tear his eyes away from hers (she looks practically _gleeful_ ) for even an instant, he’d notice that her hand is little more than a blur as she ushers him over that ledge, stroking him twice for every frantic push against her he manages himself.

Ragged gasps coalesce into a groan as Cullen grits his teeth painfully and comes, heavy spurts of semen spilling into her open mouth as he (rather unnecessarily) holds her in place. Ellana closes her eyes in concentration, self-preservation, or some mix of both, bright blue-green lights briefly extinguished as she moans and dutifully catches everything she can while guiding him through it with her hand. She only misses a bit, almost an afterthought of an aftershock leaving a white smear just above her mouth on one side, lining up almost perfectly with her vallaslin. She ignores it for long moments, instead laving her tongue over the head of his cock a few times as the motions of her hand slow, taking full advantage of those last few instants before he’s too tender to touch.

Finally, she lets his softening dick leave her grip, leaning back to wipe her lip as she smooths mindless, comforting patterns against his hip and thigh with her other hand. She’s smirking as she rises from her knees, sucking her thumb clean and fixing him with a satisfied stare as he slumps back against the wall, tries to remember how to

_Breathe._

“What…” Cullen starts, not enough air behind the word to continue, forcing him to start over as she slips her arms around his neck and presses herself against him. “What was that for?” He’d had every intention of having his way with her at their earliest convenience, but he hadn’t been prepared for such... enthusiastic impatience on her part.

“I missed you,” Ellana replies simply, shoulders rising in a coy shrug before she pushes herself up onto her toes to plant a teasingly chaste kiss to his lips. “Three weeks is a long time to go without, I was concerned.”

“You have no idea.”

_Breathe._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yaaaaaaay, we finally get to meet the Inquisitor! I'm a bad person.


	4. Chess (Part One)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen schools Neria in chess. Neria schools Cullen on the nature of existence. Part 1 of 3. Rating: T

“Maker, you are… not good at this.”

Cullen winces slightly at the look Neria shoots him. He really _had_ meant to be more tactful, but there’s simply no skipping around the issue at hand in this case, the scarcity of black tokens remaining in play compared to the overwhelming white forces speaking louder than his words ever could.

“What’s that supposed to mean? What did I do that’s so- oh, shit,” she curses as Cullen reaches across the chess board to take advantage of the opening she’s so thoroughly handed him. “Didn’t see that.”

“How could you not? It’s not like you have much left to keep track of. Check.”

She reacts to take her king out of danger, but the move is automatic, just as carefully thought out as her last few, and it’s a simple matter to put her right back in peril.

“Check.”

“ _Fuck._ ” She’s frowning, seemingly bewildered that her random movements across the board could have so betrayed her, but she presses on until Cullen finally spots a chance to put her out of her misery. It would have come far sooner, but she plays so erratically that he can’t seem to plan more than a move in advance with her, only keep his pieces well protected and react while she inevitably sabotages herself.

“That’s the game. If you took more time with your turns, you wouldn’t set yourself up to fail so quickly,” he chastises, unable to help himself, though he’s smiling as he leans back in his seat.

Neria mumbles something under her breath that sounds suspiciously like “smug prick,” but then she’s waving her hand impatiently over the board, expression set and determined. “Set it up again, I want to try again.”

Cullen chuckles, not seeing how this has any hope of going differently from the last three games they’ve played, but he obliges her, lining up their armies anew. She doesn’t even try to help.

They’ve spent the better part of the afternoon together in Skyhold’s garden, and Cullen has _almost_ gotten over the sensation that every person who so much as glances in their direction is catching them doing something wrong. Against a stronger opponent, his constant distracted reminders to himself that there’s absolutely nothing suspicious about spending time with an old acquaintance might prove a liability, but against Neria, they haven’t hurt him yet.

Later. Later, they’ll do something wrong. But this? This is fine.

Better than fine, really, since all of his justifications for their little affair have surrounded his need to get to know her properly, and innocent pursuits like games and conversation are how _most_ people accomplish such things instead of skipping straight to sex. But they’re not most people, and her repeated insistences against being his friend tend to keep her at arm’s length during the daytime hours. In fact, whenever she makes her infrequent visits to the stronghold of the Inquisition she serves whenever the mood strikes her (always when Ellana is out, and Cullen still doesn’t know how she manages it), he almost never sees her by sunlight at all.

It was sheer luck that brought him to her this time, a glimpse of her looking bored by the Inquisitor’s herb garden as he exited the chapel and a sudden rush of boldness working together to get him asking her for a game. She hadn’t agreed immediately, but now that he knows her protestations about being rubbish at chess were entirely truthful, he realizes that she was being far more obliging of him than he’d thought at the time.

Their fifth match goes much the same as the rest, with her taking a few of his lesser pieces in an initial onslaught of seeming madness before he takes complete control of the board and leaves her gnawing on her bottom lip in frustration.

“Who even taught you to play?” Cullen asks, incredulous as she sacrifices one of her bishops in an apparent sightseeing tour to the other side of the board. He’s trying not to be rude, really he is, but it’s _baffling_ to him that someone so skilled on a battlefield can be so lacking in strategy, even when it doesn’t count.

“I can go, if you want,” Neria replies testily, glaring up at him as she takes her hand off her poor, abandoned bishop. “I do have better things I could be doing right now than getting made fun of.”

“I’m sorry, really, it’s just…” he gestures helplessly at the board for a moment. “How does this happen?”

“It’s just not my game! I’m sorry if that’s a crime here,” she shoots back, watching with dismay as he continues to decimate her. “I picked it up in the Circle, but nobody ever wanted to play with me. Irving was the only one who ever had the patience.”

“I can’t imagine why, you’re great for the ego.”

“Right, because _that’s_ something you need more of.”

“Hey!”

Neria shrugs, flashes him a pleased smile, taps her fingernails idly against a discarded pawn, and Cullen decides to ignore the dig in favour of winning.

“I played Irving sometimes,” he admits after a moment, which seems to interest her.

“No kidding?”

“None of my brothers-in-arms were much for chess. Definitely more of a mage’s pastime, I suppose, and I already had a reputation for… fraternization, so I couldn’t very well play against any of your lot.” He shrugs, voice growing slightly distant. “I think he noticed that I missed home.”

“Hmm,” is all she says in reply, but then there’s an odd look in her eyes and she’s smiling as she reaches forward. “Check!”

“What?” Cullen’s head snaps down, and sure enough, her haphazard meanderings across the board have given her an (easily-countered) shot at his king. “Well, I’ll be.” That’ll teach him to get sentimental.

“Now who’s terrible?” She seems so pleased with herself that Cullen’s chest tightens curiously, and he seriously considers letting her have this one.

“Still you. I was distracted,” he says, moving out of danger, however much the moments of her satisfaction make him grin like a fool. She’s not a woman who needs unearned victories. “But… that was well done. After a fashion.”

“I’ll take it,” she chuckles, and even though he has her beat in another three turns, he thinks (hopes, at least) that they both come away from this one a little more satisfied. 

Neria leans back in her seat as they wrap up, and Cullen finds himself regretting his harsh judgments of her abilities somewhat. He finally has her right where he wants her, in the daylight where they can be together without guilt, nothing untoward in her manner or words, and he’s spent the time insulting her.

“Neria, I’m sorry, I’ve been a rather poor winner today. I suppose I just…” he trails off, distracting himself by clearing the board. “You’re so exceptional at so much. It never really occurred to me that you were even _capable_ of being bad at something.”

“Cullen, I swear, if you start talking about chivalry again, I will walk away right now,” she deadpans before her smile returns. “It’s fine. This was nice, I had fun. My strength lies elsewhere, and I’m okay with that.”

“Strength? Just the one, then?” Cullen asks, raising an eyebrow and fixing her with a rather flirtier smile than he can probably justify showing her in public. She’s being good, better tone it down.

“I misspoke,” she replies simply, instead of running with the look he gave her, and for that, he’s grateful. “My _talents_ lie elsewhere, is that better? Strength is another matter entirely, I shouldn’t cheapen the word.”

“Well, that seems a bit dramatic.”

“Does it?” she asks, seeming genuinely perplexed. “I don’t think so. Strong, weak, they’re important distinctions in people and almost nobody understands that because they’ve just become words, applicable to anything under the sun.” She hesitates. Cracks a grin. “Alright, so _that_ was probably a bit dramatic, I’ll admit.”

Cullen finds himself laughing in spite of his confusion. “Just a bit. I’m afraid I don’t quite understand, though.”

“What’s not to understand? You’re either strong, or you’re weak. One isn’t necessarily better than the other, but they dictate almost everything a person does.”

“Wait. How is strength not necessarily better than weakness?” He’s never going to truly understand this woman, is he?

“They serve different purposes. Weakness is… more of a luxury.”

Cullen scoffs, shaking his head. “Not one I’ve ever enjoyed, I should hope.”

“Oh, but you absolutely have,” Neria says, and her smile turns almost patronizing. “You were a tremendously weak person when I met you.”

“Excuse me?” How is he _not_ supposed to take that as an insult?

“Shit. I’m not explaining this well, don’t be offended. It’s not some value judgment, just a statement of fact.”

“You’re right,” Cullen says flatly, crossing his arms across his chest. “You’re not explaining this well.”

She makes a face, lips twisting slightly as she thinks. “Once you were a templar -- when you were still in the Ferelden Circle, I mean -- did you ever once do something that wasn’t expected of you?”

He’s frowning now, watching her carefully as he weighs her words, wondering where in the Void she could be going with this. “What about succeeding in joining the Order in the first place? I had everything working against me. I came from nothing, I was older than the rest, but I worked hard, I made it, and nobody expected it of me but myself,” he says, his words stiffer and far more defensive than he intends. Maybe he regrets it all now, but apparently such things aren’t so easy to quantify.

Neria just clucks her tongue and shakes her head at him, which only makes him that much more stubborn. “After that. You were strong once, and then, when you got where you were going, you earned the right to be weak, for better or for worse. That’s how it works.” She pauses only a second, and he misses his chance to interject. “Well. Not _everyone_ has to work for it, plenty of people are just lucky like that, but you get my meaning.”

When he speaks again, his voice is flat and far-off. “I really don’t. Being weak is a good thing, then?”

She sighs, and Cullen gets the impression that she’s losing patience with him. “No. Pay attention, it’s not a good thing _or_ a bad thing, I said that already. It just is what it is. After all, you _were_ still a templar.”

She spits the last word like a challenge, but it’s one Cullen refuses to rise to. There’s no understanding in that direction. “What, exactly, do you think is the difference between the two?”

“This is where you’re getting confused. Strength doesn’t mean force of will, or determination, or how well you can swing a sword, or cast a spell, or excel in any particular avenue, that’s all completely unrelated. All true strength is is the ability and willingness to go against what’s expected of you when it really counts. That’s it.”

“That’s it,” Cullen echoes, as if such a worldview could possibly be so simple. “So I was strong, and then I was weak.”

“And then… you were strong again,” she adds, and Maker, why does she suddenly look so _sad_ at that? She glances off to the side as she says the words, refusing to meet his searching gaze, and it doesn’t take Cullen long at all to figure out what she’s talking about.

“Because I survived.”

She still won’t look at him, and for the time being, he’s relieved. He’ll need a second before he’s ready for that again. “Who saw that one coming, right?”

He stubbornly shakes his head, unwilling to see things her way. “You’re wrong. It’s not something you can simply light like a candle and then snuff back out, I was strong before the Circle fell, or I never would have…” 

He can’t talk about this.

“Nah,” she says, infuriatingly dismissive as she fixes those ethereal grey eyes on him again. “A strong person would have taken the _one thing_ he always wanted.”

Cullen finds himself rendered utterly speechless, staring at her in stunned incomprehension until the full weight of her words slams into him.

“What are you saying?” he asks, and he doesn’t mean to whisper, but it suits his purposes. He spares a furtive glance around them to ensure no one is paying them undue attention before leaning across the small table between them. When he looks back, his befuddlement has given way to anger, nostrils flaring as she watches him impassively. “That if I’d _raped you_ back at Kinloch, I would have been a strong person?”

To her credit, she doesn’t flinch in the face of the storm she’s stirred up, and Cullen leans back, tries to smooth his expression into something more casual, something that won’t draw suspicion from anyone who might happen to walk by.

She doesn’t quite shrug, but her expression lifts in a similarly brief manner. “If the boot fits.”

“That’s…” he begins, and he has to reach for the right word. “Monstrous.”

“Cullen, it is. What it is,” she deliberately repeats her earlier refrain, reaching out to pick a few chess pieces out from where they stand lined up at the side of the board. “You’re trying to assign moral attributes to a system that doesn’t deal in them. Good and bad is a whole different scale that works in tandem. It’s like this.”

He’s gone beyond anger by this point, beyond confusion, and as she begins to set pieces down between them, all Cullen can do is sit and listen, let Surana’s words and peculiar opinions simply wash over him.

“There are four kinds of people in this world, and most of us will spend our lives switching back and forth between different ones.” She places the white king on the board, right near the middle. “You’ve got the ones who are strong and good. Those who go above and beyond in the name of what’s right. Obviously, this is what most of us aspire to, but it’s not a very realistic goal in the long term. Unless you’re someone… _very_ special.” She seems to hesitate for a moment, but gets past it to place a white pawn on the board, just to the left of its king. “Then you have the people who are generally good but ultimately weak. Now these people, they’re the ones to truly envy. They don’t tend to have a high survival rate, so if you ever find a way to thrive in this particular niche, that’s something to treasure.”

Maker help him, but he’s actually following her logic, here.

Neria continues unabated, as if describing something perfectly normal. A recipe maybe, or gardening tips. She places a black pawn to the right side of the king. “People who are… not necessarily so good, now. Those with baser, or darker impulses and instincts. The weak ones are the individuals who would never even _think_ to act on them, and they’re pretty much harmless. Capable of being perfectly productive members of society, good friends, caring lovers.” Her eyes flick briefly up toward his own and her look is jarringly pointed for a split second that it’s entirely possible Cullen just imagines. “But you need to watch them.” Finally, she sets a black knight down next to its matching pawn, completing the lineup. “Because a little strength can really make things messy where they’re concerned.”

That’s… 

“You’re wrong,” Cullen manages with a single shake of his head, his voice pinched, fighting him on every word. “That wasn’t me. I would _never-_ ”

“Wasn’t it?” Neria cuts him off, and while her voice is sudden steel, he’d swear on his life that it’s to cover something else. She’s been so calm until now, but as she leans forward, pressing her fingertips against the table, right behind her little row of archetypes, there’s fire behind her words. “Then tell me, Cullen, and be honest. If things had worked out differently, if, say, we’d both ended up staying at Kinloch Hold after Uldred had his way with the place, can you say, with one hundred percent certainty, that I would have been safe sharing the tower with you?”

At that, his mind just goes blank. He knows that she’s waiting for an answer, but his brain absolutely refuses to even begin processing what she’s just said, and he’s left with nothing. A complete absence of thought.

“I…”

Her expression suddenly shifts, and for a moment, Cullen is terrified that she’s read some terrible truth in him, but no. She’s looking over his shoulder with slight surprise, and before he can even think to investigate further, she’s standing to go, though she first leans over to whisper by his ear while he continues to sit in stunned silence.

“We can talk about this later. I’ll see you tonight.”

And she’s gone. He shakes his head slowly, and he feels as if he’s waking from a heavy sleep in her aftermath, finally coming back to himself after some long, strange journey through the Fade.

A shadow falls across the board, and there’s a brief second where he thinks Neria’s come back.

“Commander, that wasn’t the Hero of Ferelden I just saw sneaking off, was it? Oh, the two of you must have had a _lovely_ afternoon.”

Leliana. 

Shit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TO BE CONTINUED! As was briefly alluded to in [We'll Sweep Out the Ashes in the Morning,](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5438855) yeah, Leliana knows about them.
> 
> Man, this ended up way longer than I intended, yeesh.


	5. Chess (Part Two)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen and Leliana go tête-à-tête. Part 2 of 3. Rating: T

“By all means, have a seat,” Cullen says, dryly grinding the words out from between his lips well after Leliana has already made herself comfortable in the chair across from him. 

Leliana, for her part, blithely ignores his lack of manner and simply begins setting up the chess board with practiced ease. “I do hope you’re up for another game,” she says, and her smile turns sharp. “I simply can’t resist the opportunity to play when even you can’t possibly have the gall to accuse me of _cheating_.”

Cullen refuses to dignify that with a response, not that he likely could come up with one if he tried. He’s still reeling from Neria’s implications, shame and unease and stubbornness all warring within him to create a churn of emotions that leaves him feeling downright _ill_ , the air around him seeming to press in on all sides, and all he wants to do is take off, rage through the castle and find some recruits to yell at, anything to put him back in control of his life for a few precious moments.

Maybe he should have tried letting her win that last game, after all.

Leliana beckons for Cullen to make his opening move, and after a long, steady moment where he weighs his options and fails to see the harm in playing along, he acquiesces, earning a pleased nod from the hooded figure opposite him.

“I imagine your previous matches to have been rather one-sided,” she says lightly as she continues the game, and Cullen continues to eye her warily before wagering on a response. Aside from whispered threats against him should his libido threaten the dynamics of the Inquisition, they’ve never discussed his dalliance with Neria, leaving her knowledge of his indiscretions to instead hang silently over them both in pointed looks and a frosty demeanor during war table meetings.

“You’ve… played against the Hero before, then?” he asks, giving in somewhat with a cautious smile, and his relief when Leliana’s own expression seems to turn decidedly less predatory is palpable.

“Oh, yes. She’s terrible,” Leliana replies with a light laugh, and Cullen still isn’t sure what game she’s playing with him (certainly not chess), but he finds himself relaxing somewhat as both games continue. Even knowing that disarming him is likely her entire intent, he’s still rattled enough that he probably needs it to escape the well-worn feelings that may once have been guilt before he grew so used to them gnawing into his gut.

“Absolutely dreadful,” he agrees, huffing quietly through his teeth in mild, lingering incredulity. “I honestly don’t understand it.”

“That’s because you don’t understand _her_ ,” she says, lifting her shoulders in a slight shrug. Cullen bristles somewhat, but she’s still carrying on like this is nothing but pleasant conversation between advisors, and while he can’t help his dejected frown, he’ll go along with it for now.

“Guilty as charged,” he says, claiming one of her knights as he does so.

Leliana’s smile turns placating, undeterred. “Don’t be so glum, I promise it’s not so complicated as all that.”

Cullen scoffs, shakes his head only once. “Really.”

“Chess is a game of strategy, of looking at all possible outcomes and planning for them. Making contingencies, constructing hypothetical scenarios, always staying as many steps as possible ahead of your opponent,” Leliana explains, and Cullen watches her carefully, suspecting that this may be the whole reason she decided to sit down with him today. “You’ve a talent for such things, that’s why you’re here in the first place. Our recently departed mutual acquaintance… does not. To put it mildly.”

Glancing briefly back at the board, Cullen _knows_ that one of her rooks is no longer where it’s supposed to be, but she was right when she first sat down. Were he to call her out on the matter, she’d likely laugh in his face.

“With all she’s accomplished, even simply among the Grey Wardens, I guess I just find that difficult to believe.” Cullen knows all too well how easy it is to trip into positions of power when an institution is hurt and bleeding, but from all he’s heard, Surana deserves every last title to her name.

“There’s a reason she didn’t stay long at Amaranthine,” Leliana counters him easily (again, in both games), her voice taking on an almost reverent quality. “She lacks that foresight, that ability to see the consequences each potential move might bring down the line. She’s brilliant in the moment, capable of leading even the scrappiest of groups to undreamed-of victories, but none of it is ever through careful planning or thinking ahead. That’s _how_ she’s so amazing, she never worries about what comes next like any reasonable person would, and it brings her to conclusions no one else would ever arrive at. She makes her decisions as they come to her, and they happen to nearly always be the right ones.” 

Here she hesitates, and Cullen notices that she’s switched tactics to simply removing his pieces from the board entirely when he’s not paying attention, daring him to interrupt her to protest.

He doesn’t bite.

“But only in the moment,” she finally finishes, leaving him with a rather limited set of moves to consider. At least he thinks he understands somewhat, and sees how such a talent wouldn’t translate from the mess of the real world to the rigidity of a tiled board. Suddenly, her erratic movements make a bit more sense.

“Why are you telling me this?” he asks, lost but not ungrateful, and Leliana sighs.

“Because in spite of how disgusted I am with your terrible decisions, and in spite of how much I resent the position you’ve placed me in with regards to the Inquisitor… I still consider you a friend, Cullen. And I’d rather not see anyone involved hurt more than is already inevitable.”

He wills his hands steady to keep from fidgeting under her gaze, resisting the urge to glance around in paranoia as she voices such concerns aloud in such a public place. If there’s anyone in Skyhold who knows how and when to keep secrets, it’s the Nightingale.

“So you’re… what? Warning me?”

“No, warning you was threatening to cut your balls off if you jeopardize our efficiency because you can’t keep it in your breeches,” she says in reply, terrifyingly cheerful. “An offer that still stands, by the way.”

Nope, he’s not even going to touch that one.

“I simply want you to be aware of what you’re getting yourself into. She’s been in a bad place since her last trip north, and she won’t even tell me why. I don’t know what’s going through her head right now, other than to say that potential future consequences are nowhere to be found. Also, checkmate.”

Cullen looks down at the board with a sigh.

Some games simply aren’t fair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a quick little interlude, really, TO BE CONCLUDED.


	6. Chess (Part Three)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen and Surana have a rematch. Nobody is quite sure of the rules, and everybody will end up worse off than they started. 
> 
> Rating: E, with **WARNINGS** for some seriously dodgy non-con roleplay of dubious consent in and of itself, mid-coital panic attacks, and maybe some past gaslighting? Here there be fuckin' dragons, I don't even know what the hell happened. 
> 
> Part 3 of 3.

They haven’t been doing this long enough to truly have a routine, but as Cullen slips quietly into her quarters under cover of night and an intimate familiarity with the guard rotation, he immediately gets the feeling that this isn’t going to go the way he expects it to.

Instead of the soft candlelight he’s come to expect, the room is lit by a single wall sconce, and while the light is more than sufficient for their needs, it casts erratic shadows, leaving sections of the space shrouded in darkness. She’s dressed differently, as well, the sheer Orlesian nightdress she’s previously favoured (Cullen is sure it comes with the room; Ellana has an entire set of them in her wardrobe that she despises) nowhere to be seen as she stands before him in a simple, everyday robe of light blue. It’s a rather fetching look, to be certain, fabric hugging her body in all the right ways and sashes drawing the eye around graceful curves, but he honestly hadn’t thought she still wore such things. Much like himself, she favours armour while in the public eye, and even around Skyhold, she prefers heavier leather tunics and cloaks to the lighter garments of a mage.

Neria meets him at the door, rising up on her toes to greet him with a gentle kiss against his jaw once they’re safely cut off from the rest of the world. When he turns his head to chase after more, however, she draws back, retreating for the plush couch set against the near wall. Only the best of accommodations for their higher-profile guests. None of it helps his uncertainty any, but considering his lingering unease from all she said earlier, it’s probably best not to jump straight into bed with her, anyway. Not that that’s stopped him for long before.

Maybe he should just trust that she knows what she’s doing, but he’s got Leliana’s words rattling around in his head as well, and he honestly doesn’t know what to think anymore.

“What are you wearing?” he asks in lieu of anything more substantive as he takes a seat next to her, aiming for ‘wryly casual’ and landing closer to ‘emotionally constipated’.

Neria shoots him one of those ‘are you kidding?’ looks that he seems so adept at dragging out of her, smiling in something like amusement. “I think it’s a cotton blend?”

“No, I only meant… You’re usually-”

“Relax, I get it,” she rescues him, shrugging and reclining lazily away from him. “I just figured, after today, you might want to talk more than we usually leave time for beforehand. Might as well be comfy, right?”

Right. That makes sense.

“Of course,” Cullen sighs, oddly relieved. Something still feels _wrong_ , though. “And we should. Talk, that is, some of what you were saying earlier…”

“Left an impression, did it?” she asks, smoothly crossing her legs. Cullen notices that she’s barefoot, and he can’t help but wonder if she’s even bothered to wear smallclothes as he drags his gaze from her feet, up her body, back to her face. He’ll find out soon enough, he’s sure, but first, he has to get this out.

“You could say that. Maker, Neria, do you truly think so little of me?”

She frowns slightly at that, a crease appearing above her brow as she slowly shakes her head. “Cullen, I think the world of you. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t, wouldn’t have even bothered _telling_ you all of that if I didn’t.”

Such a statement from her should fill him with warm pride. Instead, it only unsettles him further.

“Then why would you say such things? Accuse me of…” he trails off with a helpless shrug, hating how _wounded_ he feels, though he at least manages to keep most of it out of his voice and replace it with anger. For her part, Neria continues looking so simply confused that it has to be an act.

“Accuse you of what? I stated a bit of the uncomfortably obvious, sure, but you never actually did anything wrong, at least to _my_ knowledge, and I’m not in the habit of judging people for things they didn’t do.”

“I would _never_ take advantage of one of my charges,” he harshly whispers, as if even giving proper voice to the notion is a dreadful act in and of itself. He’s pointing to punctuate his words, bracing his other arm against the back of the couch and getting agitated in spite of his intentions to keep calm, suddenly feeling very warm indeed in spite of the thin linen shirt and trousers he wears.

“Not now, obviously,” Neria patiently replies, heedless of how edgy and defensive he’s gotten. “And not before. But Cullen, you were the one who came to me, remember? Desperate to apologize for who you were in the interim. For how angry you’d been, if not with me personally, then certainly _about_ me in some broader sense. And with all the weakness forced out of you by that point, what am I _supposed_ to think?”

“Not that,” Cullen says, slumping back, the words ringing hollow even to him. Because he knows better than anyone what exactly he’s capable of, still remembers the heavy, bone-deep satisfaction his girl in Kirkwall gave him for a time (Jetta, her name was Jetta), when her eyes would roll back in her skull and she’d fall limp as his palms dug into her throat, willfully giving herself over to him in a way the real thing never would, not at the time. And even he doesn’t know what he might have done were she actually present, as perfectly frustrating as she finally is.

Neria shrugs, infuriatingly casual as Cullen frantically loosens the laces at the neck of his tunic, anything to cool himself down somewhat and make it a bit easier to breathe. “If you say so. I guess you’d know better than I would.” Letting him have the comfort of the lie.

He takes a moment to collect himself before speaking again, choosing his words carefully. “If… if you truly believe it was only my own weakness keeping me from doing anything untoward… then why did you ever give me the time of day in the first place?”

Something in her expression shifts, a flicker of some inscrutable emotion behind her eyes, and Cullen finds himself perking up. Maybe it’s nothing. Maybe it’s just that she’s done her eye makeup differently, more like she used to, though the lighting makes it impossible for him to say for certain. Either way, it’s ridiculous how quickly even the _suggestion_ that he might be close to figuring something out can supercede all else when he’s dealing with her.

“You’re so used to seeing weakness as a negative trait, it’s just ingrained at this point,” Neria says, and she’s gone back to the manner she wore back in the garden, placidly explaining her ridiculous philosophy to him. But he _knows_ he saw something else there for a second, that there’s more going on under the surface that maybe he can reach if he just works for it. Even at the risk of hurting himself. “But I never would have looked at you a second time if I didn’t see it in you at the first.”

“Maybe it would have been better if you hadn’t,” Cullen sighs, and there it is again, that slight, fleeting shift across her features, and the only reason he recognizes it this time is because he’s paying closer attention to her than the nonsense coming out of his own mouth. That and because he’s seen it so often in the mirror over the years.

It’s guilt.

He doesn’t get it yet, but he files that moment away for further dissection while he focuses instead on pulling his foot out of his mouth. Just because he _can_ say whatever he wants to her doesn’t mean that he _should_.

“I’m sorry, I don’t- I don’t know why I said that,” he says, shaking his head and moving to sit closer to her. She doesn’t reciprocate or lean in any, but nor does she move away, letting him feel the heat of her through her robe where his thigh brushes against hers. “I didn’t mean it.”

Neria just smiles. “And here I thought you were starting to pay attention.”

“Pardon?”

“Never mind.” Her smile loses the sad edge that Cullen doesn’t actually notice until its gone and she runs her bare toes lightly against his leg, right above his boot. “I’ve thrown a lot at you today, you likely think me mad. Give it all some time to settle, I promise it makes sense.”

“I don’t think you mad,” Cullen murmurs, leaning in close enough to breathe in her scent, wondering if maybe this all might come together better for him if he stops pretending they’re just two people having a friendly chat. She’s used a different soap, he thinks, something light and floral and distantly familiar. “I don’t know if I can agree with your assessment of the world, but I don’t think you mad.” Gently, he ducks his head to brush his lips just below her ear, quietly thrilling to the shiver that he feels pass through her as he does.

“I told you,” she replies, still easy even as she brings a hand to the back of his neck, runs her fingers through the soft hair there, “you have to give it time. And it’s not all as black and white as I probably made it seem earlier, either. Life isn’t a chess game, there’s room for nuance.”

“With only four types of people in the world, I don’t see how that’s possible,” Cullen says, managing a bit of dry humour as he mouths the words warmly against the side of her neck. If she wants to keep talking, he has no problem whatsoever with that.

“Don’t be obtuse,” she gently chides, playfully tugging his hair in chastisement. “Nothing is ever set in stone, and morality is far more flexible a thing than strength.”

“Is it, now?”

“Mm-hmm. More dependent on situation than anything else, I find.” She tips her head back against the couch, and Cullen takes the opportunity to suck on the soft skin of her throat, not interested in marking her at all, just in the taste of her and the sensation of her pulse fluttering beneath his tongue. Their couplings have all been desperate, forceful affairs before now, and he’s enjoying this, wants to keep her talking for as long as he can before pushing things to their inevitable conclusion, no matter how unromantic the subject.

“Situational morality. Can’t say I like the sound of it,” he admits, eyes closed as he follows it up with a slow lick against her pulse point. “Sounds like the sort of excuse I might have used once.”

“Not an excuse,” Neria explains, suppressing a shudder at the continued ministrations of his mouth. “Just the way of the world. We’ll take you, for example.”

Cullen growls his displeasure at the notion against her throat before drawing back a bit to look at her. “I’d really rather not.”

“Oh, don’t be like that,” she says lightly, smoothing his hair back with a smile. “See, you’re a good man, Cullen. I firmly believe that, I always have. But here, with me… you can’t be. You never could. It’s not your fault, it’s just… the way it is.”

This strikes him as profoundly sad, wrong in a way that he wants to object to, but she’s entirely correct. After everything awful she’s seen of him, he wants to show her that he can be this man she believes him to be, but his very presence here requires a betrayal of the cruelest kind, so it’s impossible. On any other day, he can aspire to be better, but with Neria, he’s always automatically going to be confined to the darker parts of his nature. “Your black knight,” he whispers, but he sits back, too depressed by the notion to continue.

Neria picks up the slack for him. “My Cullen,” she breathes, sliding herself into his lap and winding her arms around his neck, kissing him soundly all in one quick motion that leaves him lightheaded.

She shifts until she’s straddling him, laying claim to him with her body and mouth as surely as her words, and he lets her. Lets his body react, lets arousal take over where emotion leaves off, his cock stiffening under her gently rolling hips as he sighs against her lips. “Yours.” Eyes closed, heart heavy, and there’s a resignation to that particular truth that he can’t be bothered to fight.

She trails kisses along his jaw, humming something that sounds like an agreement as she goes, and Cullen loses himself to the slow grind of her body, warm and pliant, and the hypnotic vibrations of her whispered words against his skin. “You never stood a chance, did you?”

“Not against this,” he groans in reply, letting his head fall back as his hands roam her body and eventually come to rest against her thighs, rubbing idle circles against her clothes and pulling her as close as he can while he rocks up against her.

“I had you from the minute I saw you,” she goes on, and Cullen gets the impression that she’s losing control, her breathing growing heavier as she nips lightly against the juncture where his jaw meets his neck (though never hard enough to mark him, so maybe it’s all an illusion after all, perhaps total control is simply her default state of being). “ _Really_ saw you,” she adds, and she draws his earlobe between her teeth, which proves nearly distracting enough to make him ignore how curious that sounds.

But not quite.

“Wait, what?” he manages, attempting to lift his head but finding himself stymied when she latches her mouth back onto his neck.

“I don’t blame you if you don’t remember it happening,” she breathes, further distracting him by bringing her hands between them, resting her palms against his chest before tracing tortuously slow downward paths. “It was a long time ago.”

He does, and it was, and that’s the problem, isn’t it? And he needs another minute to put together just _why_ this is suddenly all wrong, and she’s not giving it to him, denying him the chance with insistent, clever little fingers tugging at the edge of his tunic. “What… what do you mean?” he asks with a gasp, even as she draws back and he sits up to let her pull his shirt over his head, soundly mussing his hair.

Her smile is reassuring, but there’s something darkly knowing in her chuckle as she shakes her head and kisses him quiet, tossing his shirt away over her shoulder. “Never mind,” she murmurs against his lips, fingers drawing light, purposeful patterns across all of his newly bared skin. “Don’t worry about it.”

Yeah, that’s not going to cut it for him.

_”Wait,”_ he blurts out, the word coming out more as a desperate whine than the command he intends it to be, though his hands wrapping most of the way around her upper arms are firm as he pulls her away from him.

In all the time they’ve spent together across the past few months, Neria has made one (and only one) thing crystal clear to him: that Cullen’s prior infatuation with her -- the feelings that so twisted him up and kept him awake nights even long before they were taken from him and tainted, used against him in the most horrific ways possible -- was an entirely one-sided affair. There was no secretly requited crush on her end, no forbidden fascination, and any more-than-casual affections she carries for him are for the man he is _now_ , even with all that entails. Prior to their meeting in Skyhold, he was templar and she was mage, and that was the end of it, the way it _should_ have been for him as well yet never quite was.

If what she’s saying now is true, however, if she really singled him out that night (it had to have been the night in the library, Cullen knows it, she gave him that _look_ that so confounded him and it was a lantern being lit in the darkness, she opened up to him like a flower and everything changed and it thrilled him and terrified him because he shouldn’t have cared, and that _has_ to be the moment she’s referring to) and saw something in him worth claiming, then it paints everything that followed in a new light. To every glance, every touch, every meaningless chat between a breezy young woman and a stammering mess, it adds… intent.

It didn’t begin as an infatuation. That’s the important part to remember. He was intrigued by her, perhaps a bit obsessed from the onset, but there was nothing romantic or even sexual to it. It was academic, nothing untoward or sinful involved. That came later, once she let him in just enough to believe he was getting to know her, just enough to see how amazing she was and fall. At the time, it had seemed inevitable. Now...

“You knew,” he whispers, and while his voice comes out coarse, he’s still too stunned to sound properly accusatory. She doesn’t react when his grip on her involuntarily tightens, thick fingers digging into the lean muscles of her arms. “The entire time, you knew exactly what you were doing.”

“What are you-”

“Don’t!” he snaps with a rough jerk of his arms, refusing her the chance to deny it. Because she’s not surprised in the slightest by his sudden change in demeanour, and that’s just as telling as the rest of it, isn’t it? This is exactly what she’s been waiting for, feeding him little breadcrumbs of information all bloody day then sitting back and letting him put it all together instead of just _telling_ him anything.

But why?

Finally he realizes just how tightly he’s holding her, can already see the bruises forming in his mind’s eye and lets go with a start. “Get off of me.”

“Cullen, what’s gotten-”

“Get off!” he shouts, his voice a roar _just_ loud enough to send his thoughts scrambling back to Josephine’s incessant reports on their visiting dignitaries, trying to remember if the adjacent quarters are occupied this night as he stands up, forcing Neria to scramble quickly to her feet to avoid falling.

“Cullen!” comes her cry of surprise, but her gaze turns to steel as she straightens herself up and he’s almost relieved. No more play-acting, then.

“So much time spent believing that I was nearly destroyed by my own foolish fancies, while you were… what? Wielding them like a knife all along?” he asks, pacing the room only until he catches himself doing it (Ellana is _always_ on his case for pacing) and then sitting roughly back down, on the bed this time.

Neria, for her part, won’t look at him. She crosses her arms in front of her chest and lingers a few paces away, edging toward one of the more shadowy corners of the room. “Oh, Cullen, what difference does it make?” she finally asks, sounding weary.

He’d be far more indignant at her question were it not for two truths. One, that in the grand scheme of his life and his traumas, it likely changes nothing. And two, that she herself doesn’t believe that, and Cullen has to backtrack a bit to figure out how he even knows as much.

She’s been in a bad place since her last trip north; Leliana’s words. The guilt he briefly glimpsed behind those grey eyes. Giving him only what information he needed to find his way down the careful path she laid out for him.

It’s a confession. And people don’t simply confess if they believe they’ve done nothing wrong.

“All these years,” he mutters, because in spite of his sudden rush of understanding, he’s still angry, unable or simply unwilling or dispense with empty assurances. Instead, he gives a huff that might have been a laugh in another life. “The conversations, the _flirting_ , all these years, I honestly just thought you were just being _nice_.”

She still won’t look at him, still sounds more tired than anything else as she stands there in semi-darkness, and her words should infuriate him, but they only leave him feeling cold. “What possible reason would I have had to be nice to you?”

Now _that_ gets a laugh out of him, a high, harsh bark that makes her wince, because she’s right, and none of this should come as a surprise to him. She made her continued resentment of the Circle and those who maintained it clear the night she first kissed him, even if it took him a few more days to truly understand. Hilarious.

He simply never realized he’d found someone even better at compartmentalizing than he is.

“Maker, you must have thought me so stupid,” he sighs, holding back an incredulous chuckle lest he grow hysterical and letting his anger take proper root, instead. “Laughing behind my back with your little blood mage friend about the idiot templar and his pathetic crush while you nurtured it every step of the way.”

Even later, when he was suspicious of _everything_ , this never once occurred to him. Not once. How is that possible?

“I never-”

“Never _what?”_ he spits, not particularly caring about whatever mild protestation she has at the ready now that his ire is successfully roused. It isn’t a smart emotion for him to embrace, but he’s well in control of himself, and it’s far better than simply being hurt. Besides, with Neria seemingly intent on dredging up the past, however subtly, it’s a dreadfully appropriate reaction for him. “Never saw me as a person? Never thought about what you were doing for more than a second? Andraste’s flames, woman, it was all a game to you and you nearly _ruined_ me!”

“It wasn’t a game,” Neria whispers, so quietly Cullen can barely hear it over the rush of blood through his temples, before she looks over at him and forcibly chases all traces of meekness from her voice. “As if you’re one to talk about dehumanizing _others.”_

He ignores that part. It hits too hard. He dodges, and focuses only on the blows within his power to parry.

“Then what was it? If not a game?”

“I don’t know,” she replies, stunningly casual as she raises both shoulders in a shrug and her gaze shifts to some point behind him. “Punishment?”

All Cullen can do for a long moment is stare, mouth opening and closing like a bloody fish. He’s not so much surprised that she could feel that way as he is that she actually just came out and said it. He mentally sifts through a dozen possible replies before settling on just one, a sudden sense of something like awe creeping into his voice. “Did you truly hate me so much?”

His anger seems to ebb and flow like rapid waves, something he recognizes as a sign that it won’t last and is likely unfounded. As he sits there, however, strangely impassive _(ebb…)_ and watching for her reaction, he hopes it doesn’t abandon him too quickly. He’s getting so much out of her right now.

She sighs, tired and impatient. “Cullen, hating you would have been like hating the sword someone comes at you with. Ridiculous.” She’s watching him again, eyes glittering darkly from the shadows. “But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t disarm them when an opportunity presents itself.”

The simile is an unsettlingly apt one, mindless tool for the Maker that he was, but even as he looks on in desperation and the next natural question rises in his mind (but why _me?_ ), it dies on his tongue, because he’s learning. He’s gotten better at this, at _her_ , and she’s already given him the answer.

Because she saw him, _really_ saw him. And he was weak, which made him… safe, perhaps? Simply something she could get away with? The details are still a bit slippery, but he understands enough to get by.

“Well, at least it wasn’t personal,” he mutters dryly, glancing down at his feet for a few seconds while she just stands there, clutching awkwardly at her upper arms. “You’re full of it, you know that?”

“Excuse me?” she sharply intones, and Cullen smiles to himself, bitterly pleased to be on the other side of that statement.

He snaps his head up to glare at her, but can’t stop the motion, standing up entirely just to answer the question. “Not a game, my arse,” he hisses _(and flow…)_ as he stalks toward her, downright predatory in the face of her willful ignorance. If there’s one thing she has absolutely no right to claim in this, it’s ignorance. “You’re _still_ playing them with me! Maker’s balls, do you ever stop?” She doesn’t react to his heated approach, so upon closing the gap between them in just a few large strides, he reaches out to grab a fistful of fabric at her waist, pulling just hard enough to hear one of the seams go, the quiet tearing noise serving as punctuation to his accusing words. “When was the last time you wore something like this, hmm? Trying to bring back a bit of the good little Circle mage you never were? Do you even know you’re doing it, toying with me like this, not bothering yourself with what it might bring about, what it might mean? Leliana was right, you don’t think, you just _do_ , consequences be damned.”

That finally earns him a reaction, has Neria twisting out of his grasp with a jerk and glaring at him. Her voice is still damnably even, but with a dangerous edge to it. “Life’s not a chess game, Cullen. The present is all there is. But more importantly, if I ever _do_ decide to play my kind of game with you, you will _know_ it.” The implication that he won’t like it if she does remains unvoiced, but hangs between them nonetheless. She tries to back away from him then, but she’s too close to the wall and it’s far too easy for him to stay on her, pen her in, his shadow falling across her as he slams both palms hard against stone on either side of her head.

How does he always forget how much bigger he is than her?

“I don’t believe you,” he whispers, eyes narrowing as he leans in close, and she can’t hide the hurt that crosses her features before she schools her expression back to one of steely calm. So she doesn’t like being called a liar. How can he trust that he knows _anything_ when she’s concerned, though, especially after this? At least he’s still learning.

“Fine,” Neria snaps, a warning flashing in her eyes. Rather than feeling any push to back down, however, Cullen only finds himself wondering how she can possibly seem so dangerous while pressed flat against a wall, from her head down to her fingertips digging into the stone by her sides. _By actually being dangerous_ is, of course, the obvious answer, but it somehow still stuns him. “You’re so right, everything’s a game with me, none of it is real,” she goes on, drawing the words out, at once lilting and menacing before she quirks a curious eyebrow at him. A challenge. “What are you going to do about it?”

Cullen gives a light huff, some mix of surprise, amusement, and lingering, incredulous anger, both with her and with his answer.

Once, he did the right thing, which was absolutely nothing.

But he isn’t weak anymore.

“Take what I want,” he breathes in the instant before he crushes his mouth to hers, his _body_ to hers, pinning her against the wall and swallowing her gasp of either surprise or… no. He’s done analysing her every reaction, he’s going to just let a gasp be a gasp, because even after all they’ve just been over, his erection has only flagged slightly, and she’s warm and beautiful and pliable beneath him, and he’s _done_. Grand quest for understanding be hanged, for now he just wants to consume her.

She isn’t kissing him back with her usual languid fervour, but her lips part to allow his tongue to plunder her freely, and he pulls a moan from her when he forces his thigh between her legs to press firmly against her core. He ruts up against her like that, his own bulge grinding against her abdomen, until he feels her hands finally settle against his lower back, rubbing slow circles into his skin. Only then does he draw back, lifting her up as he goes, and while she doesn’t jump into his arms, she does wrap her legs around his for stability and cling a little tighter around his waist.

Their shuffle over to the bed is a bit awkward, and when his knees make contact, he’s all too eager to throw her down onto it, hard. Neria lands on her back in a sprawl, bouncing against the mattress a few times with the force of it even as she sinks into the absurdly soft comforter and pushes up onto her elbows to watch him swiftly divest himself of his boots and trousers. Her eyes are wide and dark as he stands before her, locked on his cock as it springs heavily against his stomach, and while the light is still harsh and distant, now that they’re away from the far edges of the room Cullen can make out the flush in her cheeks, the tremors in her breathing, and it all spurs him unerringly forward and onto the bed.

She edges back slightly, at odds with the way her legs fall open to him and draw him in to settle between them as he moves forward on hands and knees to cover her body with his own. With her sudden need to clear her conscience having thoroughly put to rest any hopes he harboured for a slower, more tender encounter, he skips helping her to undress and simply hikes her robe up around her thighs in rough, impatient jerks as he goes. In so doing, he finally proves his suspicions that he wasn’t the only one not to bother with smallclothes tonight and has to muffle his ensuing groan against her throat as his fingers trace a firm, greedy path across her hip before dipping into the dripping core of her.

“You get off on this, don’t you?” he growls against her skin, and her only reply is a gasp as he buries two thick digits inside of her, pumping steadily with no preamble. “Fucking with me? Making me question every single thing I know? You _must_ , how else could you be so wet already?” Not that he’s much better, Messere I-Can-Stay-Hard-While-My-Foundations-Crumble-Beneath-Me, but that’s hardly the point.

“N-no, I-” she manages in a mediocre attempt at protest before he crooks his fingers within her, continues fucking her on them, and her words die on her tongue, trailing off into whimpers as she desperately fists the blankets at her sides.

“You’re like a demon made flesh,” he whispers, eyes closed and lips dancing across her neck with each word before he has to clench his jaw and stifle another groan, helpless against her even when he’s ostensibly the one in control. “Why else would I still need this so?”

“I-I’m sure I d-don’t know, Ser,” she stammers as she writhes beneath him, a breathy note to her voice that goes beyond arousal and that Cullen will spend weeks kicking himself for ignoring in the heat of the moment.

“Don’t… _call_ me that,” he grits out, more confused than upset, halting his assault on her cunt to bring his hand up and press his fingers into her mouth, stopping any further unsettling words at the source. She moans unsteadily at the taste of her own juices (that she _still_ hasn’t let him drink deeply of like he yearns to, and on another night he might have pressed the issue), her lips and tongue wrapping around his fingers as he grabs his cock with his other hand and lines himself up with her soaked slit.

Cullen’s heated moan as he presses into her wretchedly perfect body ends in a frustrated grunt, however, as he only breaches her entrance with the impatient red tip of his sex before encountering unexpected resistance. She’s always been tight, needing time to adjust when he takes her, but now she’s tenser than usual, with her hips canted down at an awkward angle, seeming to make it as difficult as possible to enter her.

“What are you-” Cullen starts, not bothering to complete the thought before he draws back to look at her, her eyes shut tight in pain. She’s biting him, too, not hard, but enough for him to have to take his hand back as he tries to adjust himself to her, not about to simply force his way into her body like a brute.

Well. Like _more_ of one.

She gasps, but it isn’t one of pleasure, and Cullen closes his eyes, presses a kiss to her forehead like that will smooth away the lines there as she scrunches her brow in consternation. She’s actively working against him here, she has to be, her muscles in an uncomfortable clench, because there’s no way either of them are suddenly _so_ bad at this. “It’s too big, it… please, you won’t fit.”

_What?_

“That’s nonsense,” he grits out in agonized confusion against her temple, and it’s only his increasing desperation to be buried inside of that (normally) welcoming heat that keeps him from acknowledging the sheer wrongness of everything just yet.

“I… I could use my mouth, instead, i-if it please you, Ser,” Neria says between whimpers and the dumb, incredulous look on Cullen’s face slackens into something closer to horror when her eyes flutter open and she gazes up at him in… fear. Feigned, but undeniable. “Just don’t…”

_Oh, no. No, no, no._

“Don’t do this,” Cullen gasps as he finally gets it, finishing her sentence entirely by coincidence as he presses his forehead against her shoulder like he can hide from her words, her actions, simply by ducking.

“I can’t…” she continues to bleat, squirming beneath his looming weight. “I’ve never…”

She warned him.

She _fucking_ warned him.

_If I ever do decide to play my kind of game with you, you will know it._

And Cullen, foolishly, elected not to believe her. He impugned her honesty, something she’s pushed for between the two of them from the very beginning.

_What possible reason would I have had to be nice to you?_

Well. Maybe not the _very_ beginning.

He can feel panic rising heavy in his chest, hysterical laughter threatening to bubble up out of nowhere, and the only thing that keeps it all at bay for the time being is the sickening realization that somehow, she’s doing this to prove that he can have faith in her words. Trust that, whatever she’s doing with him the rest of the time, it’s more than the idle whims of a bored mage.

_The good little Circle mage you never were._

Maybe it’ll even work.

_Fuck._

“Neria, please,” he whispers, increasingly frantic, because fear is gripping his heart in a hand of ice at the implications and he _still somehow wants her_ , his traitorous body even now rutting slowly against her for relief, desperately entreating entry. “Can’t things just be nice again?”

“Oh, Cullen,” she sighs in reply, briefly breaking character to wrap her arms around him, warm hands smoothing comforting lines down his back as she tips her head and whispers so sweetly in his ear. “Neither of us deserve that.”

Any sane man would put an immediate end to this, he thinks, just shove off of her, get dressed and go, leave her to dwell on whatever shit she’s clearly going through on her own.

But according to her own twisted logic, he’s not weak anymore, so expectations shouldn’t even enter into it. Only what he wants should matter. And maybe it’s just stubborn pride speaking or maybe it’s his own disturbed lust making excuses, but even at a hopeless disadvantage, playing whatever game this is by whatever her warped rules may be… he doesn’t want to lose to her. Not without a fight.

Back to anger, then. It’s the only thing that’s ever been able to properly shackle his fears. If she wants to keep punishing him for who he is, who he was, who he yet might be, then he’ll face it like a man. He’ll play his damned role, like he always unwittingly has. And he’ll try his level best to make her regret it this time.

He draws back with a growl that threatens to rise into a roar and pushes all hesitation out of his mind. It helps that the expectant look she regards him with is absolutely infuriating under the circumstances, and he uses it, grabs her by the waist and roughly flips her over onto her stomach, relishing her yelp of surprise.

She struggles to get her hands underneath her, but Cullen doesn’t give her the chance to get settled, just kneels, grabs her hips, and yanks them upward. The movement forces her to her knees, but without her hands there for support, she ends up with her face smashed against the bed at a brutal-looking angle, arse in the air like an animal presenting herself. Still, he doesn’t let up, planting one hand firmly on the small of her back both to keep her down there and get her robe rucked back up and out of the way before he finally slides into her, one long, smooth thrust that leaves him buried to the hilt and that she is in _no_ position to resist. He has no interest in hurting her, after all.

Neria howls at the intrusion, and the frantic movements of her arms, previously taken up with trying to find purchase against the mattress, immediately change focus to grab one of the pillows from above her head and drag it down for something to muffle her cries against. Cullen stills for a long moment, then, both to give her inner walls a chance to get used to his sudden, solid presence and to tamp down on the panic trying to claw its way up from his chest to his throat in spite of (because of?) how _good_ it feels.

He just needs control. Resisting the overpowering urge to _move_ (either within her, chasing his own pleasure, or _back_ , in some last-ditch attempt to get far away from her and this entire fiasco, he’s not fully certain), Cullen reaches forward, slow and oh-so-deliberate until he can grab her hair. As it’s still making a valiant attempt to stay in the messy vestiges of her updo, he has to call upon every bit of patience and focus he has in him to simply pick at the last few pins keeping things twisted into place and shake everything out, letting his other hand fall to her hip as he does so. All his training come full circle (hah) as he forces his breaths into long, slow pulls of air while she draws a series of short gasps beneath him and he tries to otherwise embody perfect stillness, perfect control as he wraps her chestnut locks around his fist and _pulls_.

He doesn’t yank, as this isn’t about actually causing pain. He just exerts a steady upward pressure that Neria has to move with if she doesn’t want that firm tug on her scalp to turn into something else. He keeps the motion slow, his arm straight, muscles flexed; biceps, triceps, deltoid all working in tandem to pull her up onto her hands and knees. Further then, forcing her to push off the mattress and rise using some combination of core strength and just letting him drag her upright, whimpering as she keeps her back perfectly straight to avoid moving away from where he remains buried within her. It’s such a little thing, but the simple act of willful submission, something he would never normally require of a woman, does much to settle his nerves, and as soon as she’s close enough, he relents and wraps both arms tightly around her body, pulling her flush against his chest.

“I told you it would fit,” he purrs, low in her ear once he trusts himself to speak, grinding his hips against her arse without pulling out any, just treasuring the feel of that perfect heat encompassing him, practically smothering him with sensation. “You were _made_ for this.”

She shudders, her breath coming in heavy pants, and Cullen bites back a groan as he feels it pass through her entire body. Finally, he starts to move in slow, shallow thrusts, one arm pressed possessively across her chest, while his other slides up beneath her robe to knead the soft flesh at her thigh. For her part, Neria doesn’t quite seem to know what to do with her hands for long moments, until her palms eventually find his arm, clutching and digging in with blunt nails. _Hard._

_She doesn’t know,_ he tells himself. _She doesn’t, she can’t, she’s just using a sore spot she picked up on earlier against you, she doesn’t know what this is doing, and as long as you just do your part, she never will. Just stay. In. Control._

“Don’t,” he starts, his voice faltering even as his rhythm only increases in pace, never missing a beat. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

It isn’t a threat. It’s a _plea_ , because it’s swiftly becoming clear that Cullen will do absolutely anything she feels like goading him into, and even if he can never be a good person when he’s with her like this, he at least wants to be able to try. If she’s correct and neither of them deserve anything nice, then why shouldn’t they still be allowed to _try?_

“I’ll -- _ngh_ \-- I’ll be good, _aaah_ , Ser,” she manages between stuttering gasps, hissing the words through clenched teeth and loosening her grip as he winces but nevertheless fucks her steadily.

There’s one last attempt to negotiate on the tip of his tongue, _please stop_ , but Cullen remembers that he’s apparently just as unwilling to put an end to this madness as she is and bites it back at the last second. Instead, he reaches up to pull her robe to the side and expose a shoulder, give his mouth something else to occupy itself with. Relinquishing his grip on her thigh to do so, his control over his thrusts wavers slightly and his cock slips out on a downstroke, drawing matching whines from the both of them when he fails to re-enter. Instead of pausing to resume their shameful rutting, though, he takes the chance to devote extra attention to the task at hand, just presses his hips against her to trap his still-slick prick against her arse and maintain a bit of pleasant friction while he grabs her collar with both hands and _pulls_.

It takes a few seconds for the well-stitched garment to give, but once it does, it goes quickly. He doesn’t relent until he’s torn it halfway down her back, drinking in her stunned reactions and lowly muttering “See that you do,” before he fastens his mouth to the junction where her shoulder meets her neck. In retrospect, it probably would have been easier to simply pull the robe over her head, but it also would likely have been far less satisfying, and when he presses himself between the folds of her sex this time, he punctuates it by biting down. _Hard._

Neria’s answering shout is a loud one, and Cullen has to scramble to slap his hand over her mouth and silence her before it can rise beyond a one-off curiosity in the night to anyone who might overhear.

“Sshhh, shh shh shh,” he gentles her, swiping his tongue over the marks he’s left in stark red relief on her skin, relieved not to have drawn blood because he doesn’t _want_ to hurt her (and _no_ , it doesn’t escape him, ‘I’m not hurting her,’ ‘she’s the one who really wants this,’ ‘she’d stop me if she wasn’t enjoying herself,’ ‘she pushed me to it,’ how _fucking_ many of his brothers-in-arms told themselves these exact things far too many times under Cullen’s watch, but he tried his best, he _did_ , and this is exactly what Neria wants him to be reminded of right now, knows exactly where to twist that knife for maximum carnage, but she’s misjudged somewhat this time, because she _doesn’t know she doesn’t know she can’t know_ , and the images rising to the front of his mind where they haven’t been in years have nothing to do with the pain of _others_ , they’re all his, and his own fragmented traumas have a neat way of blotting out all else, letting him push through it), he never has.

Heart suddenly pounding hard enough to worry him, Cullen inhales sharply through his nose and pushes his thumb against her mouth, parting her lips and brooking no opposition. He swipes the pad of it quickly across her tongue and retreats in case she gets it in her head to bite him right back. “You have to be quiet, now,” he says as he traces his fingertips gently up the side of her face, a hoarse whisper that he barely recognizes as his own voice. Gentle, so gentle across jaw and cheek and temple right until he presses his thumb against her forehead, digging in hard with the damp digit before dropping his hand and letting the lingering feel of cooling saliva stand as an invisible brand. “You know what happens if we’re found out, yes?”

He doesn’t wait around for an answer, pulling back and snapping his hips against her as soon as he finishes speaking, noting with grim satisfaction how muted her cry is in response. Did she anticipate how good he’d be at this? Is she surprised? Cullen honestly doesn’t know, nor does he particularly want to. Right now, all he wants is to fuck her, nothing slow in his movements this time as he plants both hands on her hips and pulls her into him with every driving press of his own body. His strokes are just long enough to get that nice slap of flesh whenever he slams home, and for a few precious moments, his mind goes blissfully blank in the face of the wet, sucking warmth of her. At least her pussy can’t betray him with games and cruelty, not for long.

Her rhythmic gasps in time with his thrusts bring him back to himself, unfortunately, and the fear comes upon him again, because no threatening _show_ , however dark, can truly grant control, not against her, and the illusion isn’t enough anymore. His looming panic is too strong, too oppressive, and he needs something _real_ if he wants to keep it at bay. Something at least _rooted_ in reality, because this isn’t him, nothing about this is him, she _has_ to know that.

Slowly, completely at odds with the inexorable drive of his cock as he continues to collide with her from behind, Cullen trails one of his hands up her body, across the drooping remnants of her robe, stopping only briefly to tweak a nipple (no smalls, no band, oh she was _ready_ for him) before continuing upward. First, he hooks his fingers under her jaw and tips her face to the side until she’s looking back enough for him to duck his head and steal a rough, off-centre kiss, ever-shifting as she jerks with every slam of his hips. Then, he wraps his fingers around her throat.

And _oh_ , there it is. Everything he’s been missing in this little charade of hers. She stiffens, and Cullen feels it everywhere they touch, from his lips still moving against hers, across the muscles of her shoulders where he leans forward against her, all the way down to the walls of her cunt clenching hard enough around him to make him moan wantonly. He’s not going to actually choke her (he would _never_ ), but he doesn’t need to, just the threat of it when he’s already told her what he’s capable of is enough. This? This is real. There are no roles to play, no cruel templar or innocent mage, only Cullen and Surana and the years in between them driving them both to terrible acts.

He draws back enough to look her in the eyes, and what he finds in them gives him pause. Wide enough to remind him of some wild Dalish thing, fear unfeigned with a warning writ clear. The warning is different from before, though; there’s no dare in it, no trace of a challenge to rise to.

It’s _real_.

Maker’s mercy, is he actually winning, here?

Shifting his grip on her neck, he forces her head forward again, presses his sweaty forehead against her shoulder while making her look away. He feels the uneasy noise she makes more than he hears it, vibrations against his palm that he carefully tightens his grip to preserve along with the frantic, fluttering beats of her pulse, because suddenly, it’s _all_ that feels real. The rest of it; the sounds they both make, the fatigue slowly creeping into the muscles of his thighs and lower back, even the brutally slow build of pressure low in his gut heralding a climax that he’s still miles away from attaining; it’s all been muted in the face of such a genuinely awful reaction.

_Real real this is real_ but it’s not, none of it is, it’s all an act and that’s a _good_ thing, isn’t it? The images in his head, coming at him with increasing clarity now, _those_ are what’s real. He need only compare her feeble, mewling protestations from tonight with the way she _screamed_ as he took her in terror, the way she battered futilely against his chest with the ineffectual fists of a sheltered young woman as opposed to the long, lean muscles she possesses now, the hot tears he cheerfully ignored as she wept beneath him, completely at his mercy. She’s a mage of unrivalled power and he is no templar, she could flay the flesh from his bones in an instant if she wanted to put an end to this, the warning she just gave him said as much, so it’s _not_ real, not like before, it never could be, _nothing_ ever could be because that’s not who he is, and as a wheezing voice makes a mockery of his name and he snaps his head up from where he’s been drawing panting breaths against her shoulder, he’s genuinely surprised to see only a room in Skyhold instead of magical barriers and piles of gore he once called his friends.

“Cullen,” Neria repeats, and he realizes that he must have said something, but he doesn’t know what. Regardless, she’s replying to it, her voice high and reedy, having to come through carefully constricted airways, and only now does he feel the comforting touch she’s been trailing against his flank for long moments now. “Cullen, it’s okay, I’m real, this is real. It’s _real_ , Cullen, I’m right here with you, I promise. Cullen, please.”

He takes a second. Blinks a few times. Steadies his breathing. Does _not_ release his hold on her throat, though he does loosen it a touch.

She doesn’t know. She doesn’t know. Because it wasn’t real. Not like this is.

None of it is okay, though.

At least she’s half right.

Panic finally subsiding, it takes Cullen a while to find his rhythm again, having gone slightly soft inside of her during all that, but her surprised exhalation that trails off into a shivering moan as he immediately gets back to it does the job of catching him up to where he needs to be.

The pace he sets is no less punishing than before, as if nothing happened to interrupt them, though the breathy quality her soft cries now carry as her throat works beneath his palm is rather hypnotic. Quickly, he brings his other hand around her from where he’s been digging divots into her hip long enough for his fingers to start cramping. Pushing aside what’s left of her robe, he reaches between her legs and briefly trails his fingers across the point where he can feel himself sliding into her before he draws back and finds her clit.

Her strained noises of pleasure take on a strange timbre then, as he rubs her with two fingers and a deftness that should surely be beyond him at this point. They seem to be trying to cohere into something more concrete and failing? As if she wants to say something in the midst of it all but can’t seem to find the words.

Personally, Cullen couldn’t care less if she spoke again for the rest of the night, even if her last words did, admittedly, pull him back from the brink of something pretty bad. As such, he’s content to just redouble his efforts, pressing open-mouthed kisses to her neck and giving her everything he has.

She was already fairly close before his unfortunate pause in activities, and with his fingers now rubbing tight little circles against her, it doesn’t take long at all for that tension she’s still carrying to grow sharper, anticipatory. “I’m… I’m…” she gasps, and Cullen draws back to run his tongue along the long underside of her ear, reaching the tip right before she comes and finally finds her words with a shattered cry.

“I’m _sorry!”_

Okay, so Cullen wasn’t expecting that.

He coaxes her through her climax with sudden gentleness, blinking back some rather bewildering tears and finally releasing his hold on her neck while she whimpers and sags back against him.

He’s not sure what to do with that just yet, except for one point that immediately leaps out at him, and that he grabs on to out of desperation and a lack of other options.

Whatever game she decided to pull him into after he insulted her?

She just lost.

All that’s left is to play out his win.

Pulling out with a hiss, because of course _now_ is when he finally starts feeling a good build, he pushes her down to the bed, turning her onto her back with firm movements. She looks exhausted but wary, something pained in her expression as he spreads her legs, and retakes his original position between them. There’s no resistance this time, and he sighs in supreme satisfaction as he enters her one last time and reclaims that feeling of _home_ that he only gets when joining with her like this. He wonders if she feels it too, if she’s just as conflicted by it now as she was the first time they slept together like him.

Any further thoughts he has on the matter are lost as he closes his eyes and fucks her into the mattress, his pace brutal not out of any need to possess or get one over on her this time, but simply to chase his own release as swiftly as possible now that it’s within reach. She presses her legs snugly against his waist and he angles himself as deeply inside her as he can get, hips slamming into hers as he plows her, and it’s long moments before he realizes that what he thought was just the sound of blood rushing in his ears is actually Neria talking in rapid, nonstop undertones.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Cullen, you didn’t deserve it, any of it, you never did, I thought I was being so fucking clever, rebelling in whatever small way I could, but I was wrong, I was so wrong, I was doing exactly what the Chantry wanted me to, helping destroy something special, Cullen, I’m _so fucking sorry…”_

Making heads or tails of it is beyond him just now, with his balls drawing up tightly instead of slapping against her arse and a low rumble rising from somewhere deep within his chest completely unbidden. He can process all of that once he’s no longer on the cusp of spilling, for now, all he has the presence of mind for is that one singular notion he previously latched on to.

Winning. Seeing this through to the bitter end and securing his victory.

What would he say? In this situation, if it _was_ real (in the way that it isn’t, it’s still real in the ways that _truly_ matter, and he cannot get all tangled up in those confusing distinctions again), if he was himself, and she was _Neria_ , and they were still doing this at a time when they _never_ really would have, where would his mind be?

Ducking his head to press his face against her neck as his thrusts grow increasingly frantic and final, he manages three words in a surprisingly lucid whisper before he’s lost, coming hard and moaning uncontrollably.

“I love you.”

His moan trails off into a high, helpless noise that would be embarrassing under any other circumstance, and he almost _(almost)_ doesn’t hear her sob rise above it as he collapses at her side.

She turns away from him immediately, curling in on herself next to him on the bed and facing the wall while she cries. Cullen finds himself left panting in his nonexistent afterglow, lost for words.

Maybe there just isn’t anything left to say after that.

Checkmate.

Carefully, he reaches over to her, only to have her recoil sharply at the first brush of his fingertips at her back.

“Neria…” he says, but there’s nothing else, and at least she can’t see the pained expression he sports. Maker, but he must look pathetic.

When she speaks, her voice is impressively steady, given that it gives way to more noisy, hitching breaths as soon as she finishes.

“Just go, Cullen.”

He hesitates for only a few beats before rolling off the bed and onto his feet, unsteady for just a moment further. He tracks down his clothes, scattered around the room, and dresses in silence, hung up on the soft sounds she continues to make as she cries there in her ruined robe. He very nearly leaves it at that once he’s got his boots on, suspecting that anything further he can do here will only make things worse, but he can’t.

He sits back down on the bed, and the size of it means he has to lean over pretty far to reach her. She tenses up as she senses him in her personal space, but Cullen doesn’t attempt to sway her into turning back toward him or anything like that. He just says the only thing that he can be sure of right now, before he thinks all of this over but with every scrap of anger he previously carried thoroughly fucked out of him.

“It wasn’t your fault. What happened to me wasn’t… Nobody could have seen that coming. It wasn’t your fault.”

When she doesn’t say anything further, he presses a kiss to her shoulder, short and chaste, stands up, and leaves. Apologizing for his own part in all of this can’t come before he figures out what in the Void all just _happened_.

Not until the next morning, when a frazzled Josephine reveals that their most esteemed guest apparently just _took off_ before dawn without telling anyone, does it occur to Cullen that even in chess, some games simply have no winner.

He refuses to meet Leliana’s questioning glares.

Some games simply aren’t fair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, um. This thing reeeeeally got away from me, as I'm sure is probably obvious. It also took me three frickin' weeks to crack, so I have no idea how it even comes across now, and I should probably step back for a week or so to see how it reads with fresh eyes, but tbh I am just ready to MOVE ON, so here it is in all its whatever. Big ups to anyone still with me after ALL THAT, it's all uphill from here for these two until everything inevitably crashes and burns spectacularly, I promise.
> 
> Took the word 'drabbles' out of the description for this fic because hahahahaha this was over 10,000 frickin' words who am I even kidding. Why did I even write this, what the FUCK is this, JFC. At least I didn't post it on Valentine's Day.
> 
> What's next? WHO KNOWS, I'VE LOST MY DAMN MIND.


	7. Codex: Three letters found around Skyhold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three letters, left in the aftermath. Rating: G

_**The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else.** _

 

_A letter, left on a table in the rookery._

         L.

Sorry I’m not saying goodbye. I just need to get out of here, right now.

You told me to be careful, and I did not. That’s on me. We could both probably stand to listen to each other more often, I think. Food for thought, going forward.

I’m okay. You don’t need to worry. And I’ll be back, eventually. I just need some space, you know how it is. Maybe you don’t? Doesn’t matter, we can discuss it when I see you again.

Take care. Try not to save the world too much.

         N.

And please don’t be too hard on him.

_(This last bit is underlined several times.)_

  
  


********************

  
  


_**I should be at peace. I have understood. Don’t some say that peace comes when you understand? I have understood. I should be at peace.** _

 

_A letter, left unfinished._

        Ellana,

Please come home. I

  
  


********************

  
  


_**The comic is the perception of the opposite; humor is the feeling of it.** _

 

_A letter, left crumpled by the side of a nearby mountain pass._

         My Love,

I hope this letter finds you well. We’re getting by here, but the O’s are up my A and the I’s in everyone’s B, so I’ve sent my scribe off and am writing you instead of either dealing with any of it or dashing my head against the wall, since both options seem equally appealing right now. Pros and cons, and all that. I do hate being unable to speak freely with you, however, so it will brief no matter what.

It never gets any easier, being away from you. Even now, when the waits are so much shorter than the years you spent away (and may yet spend again), every day is a fresh hurt. I’d give anything to hear your voice right now, to feel your touch, see your smile (you know the one). The only thing that makes it better is the knowledge that you’re doing it for us, and you know what? I honestly don’t know if this is at all romantic any more or just whiny, so I think I’ll simply end it quickly and write again in a fortnight.

I love you. I miss you. I’ll see you soon.

        You-Know-Who

PS: What did the bear say when the druffalo beat him at cards?

I’ll tell you when you get back here. Promise it’s worth the wait.

  
  


********************

  
  


_**What is love? There is nothing in the world, neither man nor Devil nor any thing, that I hold as suspect as love, for it penetrates the soul more than any other thing. Nothing exists that so fills and binds the heart as love does. Therefore, unless you have those weapons that subdue it, the soul plunges through love into an immense abyss.** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After the last monster of a chapter, I'm switching gears for a few shorter, non-plotty one-shots, hopefully that's not too much of a disappointment! Just gotta dial it back for a while and regroup before picking up the thread of the story again, you know?
> 
> Anyway, rest in peace Umberto Eco, who was the source of the bolded, character-defining quotations in this one. We should all dream of being so fucking transcendent.


	8. First Times (Four Vignettes)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everyone has a first. Alternate Titles: The Chantry Ruins Everything, or Who Wants A Few Thousand Words Of Awkward Teen Sex??? Rating: M

** Neria **

“You didn’t.”

“I did.”

“You _didn’t.”_

“I did!”

“Really?!”

“Why are you so shocked? I told you I going to make it happen, it was only a matter of time.”

“Yes, but… When? Where? With who?!”

“Now, now, Jowan, a lady doesn’t kiss and tell.”

“Well, if I ever see a lady, I’ll keep that in mind. Spill.”

“Tch, fine. Last night. That side chamber off of the store rooms. Enchanter *******.”

_”Him?_ But he’s so old!”

“Oh, he is not, he’s barely twenty.”

“What did he even see in some un-Harrowed apprentice?”

“Um, my irresistable feminine wiles, obviously. Arsehole.”

“Alright, whatever. How was it, then?”

“It was fine.”

“Just _fine?”_

“Well, more than that, obviously. It was… an experience.”

“Wow, don’t try to oversell it, or anything.”

“What, you want me to give you all the gory details, perv?”

“Kinda, yeah.”

“Ew, forget it!”

“Well what’s the point of even telling me in the first place, then? Come on, at least give me _something_ to work with.”

“Ew.”

“Oh for… Not like that! Maker willing, this will be relevant for me eventually. This is my chance to get, you know, inside information from the other side before I have to figure it out. Would you have me waste that?”

“Ugh, for the sake of whatever poor girl you somehow manage to con into bed, I guess not. What do you want to know?”

“I don’t know. Logistics, I guess? How’d you do it, what was the lead-up like, how long did it take, that sort of thing.”

“Okay, I guess that’s fair. We were, you know, lying down, sort of in the corner? He brought some blankets. And there wasn’t a lot of… preamble, I guess? Just kind of undressed and got right down to it after making out for a little while. You never know who’s going to come down there at any time, so it was pretty rushed.”

“Yeah, that’s sort of a given.”

“Other than that, I don’t know, it just sort of happened. He asked me if I was sure a few times, used his hand for a bit until he decided I was ready, and-- okay, quit making that face, you’re the one who wanted details, pal.”

“I _know_ , but now I’m actually picturing it, and it’s _weird_. Sorry, keep going, this is good, this is useful.”

“Whatever, there’s not much else to tell, anyway. Just kinda worked his fingers up there for a minute or two and then _whoa_ there it was, and now I’m gonna rant for a second, bear with me. Because I don’t know what guys all get told about it, but the party line I was always fed was along the lines of ‘maybe it’ll hurt a bit, maybe it won’t, just make sure he takes it slow the first time and it’ll be fine’, that sort of thing.”

“Pretty much what I’ve heard, too, yeah.”

“Right? Good. But guess what? It fucking hurt. And I mean _hurt_. Like, ‘oh Maker, I’ve made a terrible mistake and am never doing this again, sorry for forsaking you’ hurt. Maybe it’s just me, or maybe *******’s just a dick who didn’t care about being careful, and it _did_ ease up eventually, once he’d been going for a little while, but I feel so betrayed by the universe and all women ever for not adequately preparing me. Maybe the stories are all made up by prissy former nobles who all got their cherries popped rising horses before their magic showed up, I don’t know. I’m happier than ever to actually have it over with, but it was _so_ not fine at the time.”

“Well, now I’m terrified. Great. How are you feeling now?”

“You’re not the one who has to go through it, what do _you_ have to be scared of? And I was sore for a little while afterward, but it’s okay now. Thanks.”

“That’s all that matters, right? And it wasn’t the whole time, at least.”

“Yeah. It actually started to feel pretty good near the end there.”

“Did you… you know?”

“Know what?”

“You know. Did you… finish?”

_”Oh,_ oh, of course. Um. No. But like I said, it was at least starting to go somewhere by the time he did, that’s something, right?”

“I _guess.”_

“Whatever, virgin, you don’t get to judge anymore. Catch up first.”

“Mm-hmm. So are you going to do it again?”

“Eh, probably not with *******. But yeah, why not? I mean, it can only get better, right?”

 

_(It embarrasses her now, but try as she might, she honestly cannot remember his name for the life of her.)_

 

 

** Ellana **

It’s perfect, she thinks. A little bit _too_ perfect, actually, and she knows it’s terrible of her, but Ellana really kind of wants to make it clear that she’s known exactly what Jaran had planned for this afternoon from the beginning, just to keep him from feeling like he’s somehow gotten the better of her by getting her on her back.

It’s ridiculous, she knows it. She wouldn’t be doing this if she wasn’t certain she wanted it, and he’s not stupid enough to think he could ever trick her into such a thing with a nice lunch and a bit of charm. And no matter how obviously premeditated it all is, that doesn’t change the fact that it’s been absolutely wonderful. The grass beneath them is about the softest she’s ever felt, sunlight falling through the trees and scattering around the glade just so, and she has to wonder how long it took him to find a place so lovely yet _just_ far enough off from the aravels to rouse her suspicions as he led her straight to it.

Maybe it’s not such a bad thing, having him think he’s just such a player that she couldn’t help but give in, because he seems to be riding a wave of uncharacteristic boldness as he trails kisses along her jaw and down her neck, groaning softly against her skin. She’s known Jaran was going to be the one for weeks now, anyway; revealing how wise she’s been to his machinations will only show off how much of a sure bet she was to begin with, too. Besides, it’s probably too late to seem particularly clever about this, now that he’s already on top of her and her hair is fanning out beneath her head as she wriggles on the ground to get comfortable beneath him.

He’s only a bit taller than her, nearly a full year her junior but already making a name for himself as a promising young hunter. Not perfect by any stretch, but who is? With long, tanned limbs twining around hers, gently tugging her leathers out of the way as they go, dark hair and dark eyes but the lightest of moods about him, she thinks that this _has_ to be as good as it possibly gets.

After, then. It won’t pack the same punch, true, but at least that way they’ll both have all of their cards on the mat. That’s how the shems say it, right? Something like that, she’ll have to ask one of the traders more about it later on, and these erratic thoughts are how Ellana comes to realize that she’s a little bit nervous about all of this, after all.

“Is this… all right?”

Still, when Jaran pauses in carefully fondling one of her breasts, his eyes wide, her heart racing, she doesn’t even have to think about the answer to his question. When she’s made a decision, it stays made.

_”Duh.”_

She rolls her eyes and pulls him back down to crush her mouth against his, replacing his easy caresses with something even better.

Perfect, even if it turns out they aren’t far enough away for the rest of the clan to miss the small, ensuing lightning storm.

 

_(Their relationship didn’t even last the month. None of the clan boys could keep her attention for long, but she still thinks of him in particular with fondness. Just another reason she needed to leave, though.)_

 

 

** Cullen **

Hurry. That’s the one big takeaway Cullen gets from all of this as Ava presses him firmly against the darkened Chantry wall and kisses him hard; that they have to hurry. That, and he’ll probably have completely given up his spot at the Maker’s side by the time this is all over, but mostly just that they have to hurry. That there’s no telling how long they’ll be alone for. That getting caught like this is not an option. Hurry, hurry, hurry.

She’s far more confident than he is, which comes as something of a relief, because Cullen is fairly certain that if _neither_ of them knew what they were doing, they’d never get anywhere like this, tucked away in a far corner of a quiet alcove instead of readying the place for evening services like they’re _supposed_ to be doing.

Ava knows, though, and her fingers are quick as she undoes his breeches, pushes them down just enough to grasp his cock, and swallows his ensuing gasp, keeping him nice and quiet. There’s a rough sort of practiced finesse to her strokes, and she gets him good and hard quicker than he’s ever thought possible, leaving his head absolutely swimming as he bucks up into her grip. Then it’s gone, just as fast, and he doesn’t even have time to be disappointed before she smiles, nips his bottom lip one last time and spins them around so she’s facing the wall and he’s got her within the circle of his arms.

He has just enough time to wonder how this is happening, why the only female recruit stationed there could have set her sights on _him_ , of all people, before she pulls her own pants down, exposing the firm muscle of her ample rear to him as she spreads her legs and Cullen forgets how to breathe.

He presses up against her because it feels like the thing to do, panting heavily in her ear as he tries to figure out how to proceed. Logically, he knows what to do here, but he’s wary of fumbling and needs to take a second to steady himself, formulate a plan of attack. He thinks it would be easier if she was facing him and he still had the delicious distraction of her lips to focus on instead of the way her short black locks fall in front of her face as she presses her forehead against stone and waits for him to get his act together. But that's neither here nor there.

It’s not that he’s _completely_ inexperienced, but he’s been told by several quarters now that any previous tender exertions he’s had, mouths and hands and late nights in the barracks, don’t really count for anything. Personally, Cullen doesn’t see why it should make a difference, fooling around is fooling around, no matter the gender of the other person involved, but he’s been told that it does, for whatever reason, and who is he to know better?

He reaches between Ava’s legs to quickly get the lay of the land, as it were, and he’s unprepared for how slick she is down there. He’d kind of thought that ‘make her wet’ was a figure of speech, though he now realizes how ludicrous that was. He probably should have thought about the details of sex more in general, before it was too late, and under other circumstances, he’d laugh at himself for finding a brand new consequence of being so dedicated to his training most of the time. As it stands, he just strokes his fingers against the inviting warmth of her folds, seeking, refusing to let his hesitance show through in his actions. She has to know by now that he hasn’t done this before, but she’s still jutting her arse out at him in invitation, and he forces his movements to retain an unearned certainty as he figures out where he’s supposed to stick it.

Once he does, it’s a revelation. Natural and obvious and _right_ , and he relishes the way her shudder seems to flow right through her and into him as he sheathes himself inside her in a few stilted motions.

Cullen wishes for so many things, then. He wishes they had more time, wishes he could savour this instead of making himself mindlessly rut her before their luck runs out, wishes he could lavish kisses on every part of her, wishes he didn’t have the looming spectre of _everything else_ pushing him to end this as quickly as possible. He wishes her body wasn’t still such a mystery to him, mostly clothed even as he experiences the best it has to offer, the warmth and tightness of her walls around him seeming utterly _impossible_. He wishes they didn’t have to stay so quiet, wishes he didn’t have to bite the inside of cheek hard enough to bring tears to his eyes just to keep silent because she feels _so good_ and he wants to shout it to the heavens, wishes she could grace him with more than muted gasps as he drives into her, wishes he could have proper reactions to read into and learn how she likes it.

Maker’s breath, but he’s greedy. That this is happening at all is a miracle, isn’t it?

It doesn’t take him long at all to reach his peak, but fortunately, whatever she’s doing with her hand between her legs as he desperately fucks her from behind gets her to a similar state before he can’t hold it back any longer. Keeping one hand on her hip, he slaps the other against hers on the wall where she’s supporting her weight just as the sudden clenching of her muscles around him _wrenches_ a climax from him and he spills into her with a few quiet, whimpering sighs. He hasn’t even caught his breath when she turns, causing him to slip from her body and gasp slightly at the feeling of his dick meeting the cold Chantry air once again. She smiles sweetly, somehow already doing her breeches back up while he gapes at her like a fool, before pulling him down to plant a quick kiss on his cheek and heading off on her way.

It’s going to take him a while to figure out how he feels about this. Some things just can’t be hurried along.

 

_(They got together twice more before she washed out of the Order entirely. He was sad about it for a while, until eventually he realized she was one of the lucky ones after all.)_

 

 

** Alistair **

The man is absolutely obsessed with her tits. Absurdly so. Over the course of the evening, it’s managed to go from something amusing, to something arousing, to something kind of annoying, before swinging all the way around to just being _wildly_ entertaining on several different levels, even if her chest is liable to be covered in bruises come the morning thanks to his incessant pawing.

“Mmm, yeah, that’s nice,” she sighs as Alistair’s lips close around a nipple and he suckles gently at her, palming her other breast as he looks up at her for guidance that she is more than willing to provide. “Just like that, yeah… oh, yes... Don’t be afraid to use your teeth a bit, long as you don’t bite, it’s fi _aaaaaaaah_ yeah, that’s perfect, that’s so g- _ow!_ Yeah, okay, that would be a bite,” and then she’s dissolving into a fit of giggles that she doesn’t even recognize as a sound she’s capable of making as he gives her a sheepish look and she affectionately clutches his head to her chest.

He presses a kiss to her sternum, rubbing his cheek against her breast in apology like a cat with a corner before she tugs him up to claim his mouth with her own, smiling against his lips as he hums in simple satisfaction, even with the heavy jut of his erection pressing against her thigh. He’s gotten hard again remarkably quickly, having come in his breeches almost immediately upon getting her shirtless in his lap, and she can’t help but be impressed by his eager refusal to let his own inexperience get in the way of their enjoyment. 

He’s never let anything get in their way. Even her.

“Oh, come on now, I’m not _that_ bad at this, am I?” he asks as he draws back, his smile gone hesitant and crooked, and all she can do is look at him in confusion. At least until he reaches up with one hand to gently brush away tears that she can’t recall shedding and she flushes at the realization.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t-” she starts, shaking her head slightly while his expression shifts to one of concern and he cradles her cheek. Hadn’t she _just_ been laughing like an idiot, the way only he can get her to?

“What is it? What’s wrong?”

She closes her eyes for a long moment, taking a deep breath and calming her suddenly erratic mood by focusing on his touch until she can look upon him and smile again. “I just… I don’t understand what I did to deserve you.”

“I know, right? Must have been something awful, but I’m not about to complain about it,” he jokes, without losing that slight edge of worry.

“I mean it,” she continues, resting her hands against the back of his neck to keep him close. “Can we stop pretending I haven’t been terrible to you?”

She can feel him frown from where he’s nuzzling against her temple, but he doesn’t pull back any. “You… are going to have to explain that one, I’m afraid. Because so far, tonight has been nothing but a dream come true. Use small words, there’s still not a lot of blood getting to my head.”

She huffs out a quiet chuckle at that in spite of herself, closing her eyes once more. “Before tonight, obviously. With… Zevran, and Leliana, and… even after we were together, at the Pearl…”

“Wait, wait, wait, is that really it?” Alistair asks in a rush, finally leaning back to take her in, in all her bewilderment. “Maker, you’re serious. You really think I care about any of that?”

“I… yes?”

The relieved smile he fixes her with makes her chest seem to want to cave in on itself. How is _she_ the one who feels completely lost right now, when he’s the damned virgin? “I mean, fine, let’s not pretend I wasn’t _wildly_ jealous, but that was on me, not you. You were willing to wait for me. To be ready, for us to do this right; you never pushed, or judged, or asked for more than I could give. The absolute least I could do was offer you the same in return.”

She blinks at him, owlish in the dark shadows of the tent as she processes that. As awareness dawns, the words rise to her lips automatically, like bubbles to the surface of a pond.

“I wasn’t ready yet, either.”

“I am so glad you didn’t make me say it, that would have felt _really_ presumptuous,” he cracks, and suddenly she’s not sure if it’s affection or fear that makes her chest keep tightening like that. Maybe a bit of both.

“Alistair, I… don’t know what to say.”

“I wouldn’t know what that’s like, but as long as you don’t try apologizing again, you should be fine,” he replies, grinning briefly before his expression softens and he leans in to rest his forehead against hers, already so adept at these small, casual intimacies. “Us, now, going forward, that’s all I care about. Anything you got up to before doesn’t matter. It’s not as if you belong to me.”

“That’s just it, though,” she answers back, voice dropping to a whisper to keep it from breaking. She is _not_ going to cry again. Quickly, taking back the illusion of confidence without a second of further hesitation, she plants her hands on him and pushes against his shoulders. He humours her, rolling smoothly onto his back as if she could ever have a hope of moving that massive wall of muscle and man herself, and just like that, she’s straddling him. She sees him swallow thickly as she leans forward, breasts brushing against his chest and making her shiver until he starts palming them anew (and yes, she is definitely going to look like an ogre hugged her in a few hours), her next words barely audible.  “I do. I think I always did.”

Several minutes later, however, when he’s got his arms wrapped tight around her, when she’s bouncing in his lap, when he seems to have forgotten any word but her name, when they’re sharing breaths as he fills her over and over again… 

Suddenly, being his doesn’t seem quite so scary.

 

_(He didn’t get his wish, that she should be his only, as well as his first. But even that turned out to be for the best in the end.)_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a bit of character-building fun and then OOOOOH SHIT SURPRISE SURANA POV. It'll probably be a while before that happens again, ha~


	9. Swordplay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen is acting weird, and Ellana goes on the offensive. They say confession is good for the soul... Rating: G

“All right, shield up, show me what you’ve got.”

“Cullen, you know exactly what I’ve got. Absolutely nothing, that’s what I’m trying to _fix.”_

He chuckles at that, low and rich and carried on the breeze to reach only her ears, and it’s been such a rare sound of late that Ellana instantly knows she made the right choice in proposing this, however much of a fool she makes of herself in the process.

“That’s not even remotely true, come on now,” Cullen chastises her with a smile, beckoning again for her to take a fighting stance. His own stance has been unflagging the entire time, naturally. “This is hardly the first time you’ve held a sword. And I could point out all manner of things you’ve otherwise… _got.”_ His voice dips a little on the last word, his smile gaining that might-be-professional-might-just-not bit of lasciviousness that he’s so adept at, but Ellana doesn’t have the chance to enjoy the bit of flirtation; he punctuates it by stepping forward and striking roughly at her loosely-held shield, sending a painful jolt up her arm and forcing her to tighten up her posture.

“Ow! All right, all right, let’s do this.”

“Better,” Cullen replies, his smile turning to a smirk. “Don’t think I won’t knock you down just because I love you. This _was_ your idea.”

“And it’s already paying off dividends,” Ellana replies, trying to remember everything about stance and grip that he’s ever pointed out to her while overseeing his troops sparring and putting it to use. “Where has _this_ man been all week? He looks an awful lot like the Commander I came home to, same height and build and all, but he’s far less moody. Couldn’t possibly be him.”

“I have not been -- _moody,”_ , Cullen splutters, ostensibly in surprise, though she can tell he’s been expecting something along these lines for a while. “Maker, is this why you wanted to do this all the way out here?”

Ellana spares a glance to their isolated surroundings, down in the valley far from both Skyhold and associated encampments, and actually manages to properly block when Cullen takes advantage of her seeming distraction by moving in and trying to sneak his blade around her shield. 

Although now she’s not entirely certain whether it’s the conversation or the sparring that’s the actual distraction from the other.

“No,” she chuckles, preening slightly at the successful maneuver. “I wanted to do this all the way out here to keep from embarrassing myself in front of everyone. But if it means loosening you up a bit as well, so much the better.”

He makes a face like that he’s about to keep protesting, but even his legendary stubbornness can only take him so far and he relents somewhat. “I suppose I have been a bit… inattentive of late. I apologize.”

“I don’t want you to apologize, you ridiculous man, I want to know what’s wrong,” Ellana sighs with affectionate exasperation, making a cautious, awkward assault of her own that Cullen barely has to nudge aside.

“Nothing is wrong,” they both then say in unison, Cullen’s frown an instant mirror to the sudden smug look she flashes him, though she quickly dials it back. She’s been concerned, but she knows how private he can be, and the last thing she wants to do is badger him into telling her anything.

“It’s fine, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. Just… know that I want to help. However I can. _If_ I even can.”

“I… thank you,” Cullen replies, and while he seems to relax somewhat, Ellana knows better than to take that particular bait. Being ‘inattentive’, in his eyes, simply means that he’s had 51 things constantly occupying his thoughts as opposed to the usual 50, his mind always churning away, and she’d be a fool to think he’s not as acutely aware of her actions as ever. Instead, she just circles. “It’s nothing, but… you _are_ helping. Know that.”

She knows. She also knows that it’s not nothing, but then, so does he. And he knows that she knows, and vice versa, and from there, it all gets bogged down in semantics that aren’t worth dwelling on anyway, so she doesn’t. She just keeps her guard up and nods, and they fall into a tentative hush while he lets her come at him, goading her on with the occasional strike of his own but letting her otherwise find her own way around the unfamiliar weapons. Since this so obviously isn’t actually about any sort of training (she’d be back at Skyhold aggressively locking staves and trading barbs with Dorian like she always is if that were the case), even the quiet is worthwhile.

Long minutes pass this way, with the only sounds being the constant thump of her hits, the arhythmic crunch of his boots in the light layer of spring snow, and distant birdsong. Eventually, she sees an opening and gets lucky enough in exploiting it that Cullen has to parry the blow with his own blade (easily, of course, but that isn’t the point) instead of simply edging his body a few inches to the left or right to block, and she’s still riding the brief high of adrenaline and self-satisfaction when he suddenly breaks the silence.

“It’s Surana,” he blurts out, voice strained.

“What?” Ellana obtusely asks, though her mild confusion is nothing compared to the stunned look Cullen himself wears, seemingly dumbfounded with himself merely for speaking up. “The Hero of Ferelden? What about her?”

“I-it’s… I…” he stammers in a way she hasn’t heard before, (Creators, but he is _really_ thrown by this) and she briefly holds back her playful assault. Even more surprising is when he doesn’t prompt her to do otherwise. “The last time she was here, we… parted badly.”

“Is that what this has been all about?” Ellana asks, torn between relief and further confusion. “You had a fight with the Warden-Commander?”

“It wasn’t… it’s not…” he tries and fails to reply before squaring his shoulders with a rather sullen sounding “It’s complicated.”

‘Complicated,’ of course, being Cullen-speak for either Kinloch or Kirkwall, meaning she knows better than to pry too deeply therein. He’ll tell her the details when he’s ready, if he ever is, and that’s enough.

“Oh no,” she says instead, shaking her head slightly. “Does this have anything to do with the way she left? Josephine was _livid_ , or as close to it as she ever gets! Caused quite the uproar in the local nobility with the way they gossip, supposedly.” It’s precisely the sort of thing that makes Ellana grateful she spends most of her time abroad, in fact, and there aren’t very many of those.

“I… probably,” Cullen continues to mope before his eyes widen and his tone brightens with agitation. “Please don’t tell her. If she thinks it was my fault, I will never hear the end of it.”

Ellana laughs in spite of them both. “Far be from me to turn you into the pariah among my advisors,” she teases before her smile softens. Whatever happened, whatever the reason, this matters to him quite a bit, and she won’t make light of that. “Your secret is safe with me.”

Far from the relief she hopes to see, however, Cullen makes an almost pained expression at that, one he swiftly moves to swallow and hide. “You’re too kind,” he murmurs before abruptly changing tack, grinning rather wolfishly and stepping forward to knock his shield into hers. Somewhere in all of that talk, she let her arm come down and in overcompensating for his sudden approach, she loses her balance entirely and he shoves her down to land hard on her arse.

Well, she can’t say he never warned her.

“Your form’s still terrible, though.”

It’s his way of telling her that he’s done talking about this without actually saying as much, and the scowl she fixes him with hides a playful moue. This is more than he’s given her all week, after all. It’ll do. Laying her shield on the ground at her side, she raises her hand expectantly in the air and he smiles crookedly as he sheaths his sword, wraps his fingers around her wrist, and hoists her to her feet in one smooth, swoon-worthy motion.

“Maybe I need a more… hands-on demonstration, in that case,” she says, sword arm behind her back, not letting go of his hand with the other as she sidles up to him, biting her bottom lip for good measure.

“Wait… is _that_ why you wanted to do this all the way out here?”

Ellana shrugs innocently, twining her fingers around his and stepping in close.

“I can have more than one reason for things. Can’t I?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I just realized it's been three weeks since I updated, yikes! No deep dark reason for that, I just started a new Inquisition playthrough and I'm sure we all know how _that_ goes, but I put together a quick Sunday update as we try to get back to what passes for a plot around these here parts. Hope everyone had a good Easter and/or long weekend~
> 
> ha ha who are you even supposed to be rooting for in this story, i don't know anymore


	10. Building a Ship to Wreck

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It had to happen eventually. The Herald of Andraste meets the Hero of Ferelden. Rating: G

It’s early yet, and the Rest is quiet as a result, occupied mainly by servants and messengers in between shifts, the air light and casual. As the sun sets, the soldiers and scouts stationed around Skyhold will begin filing in and things will get rowdier, the tavern filled with the crowded, bustling joy of men and women unwinding from a busy day of keeping the world just a little bit safer, but for now, stillness and quiet conversation reign.

Ellana suspects that’s why she finds her quarry at the bar, quietly nursing an ale, instead of upstairs at the table she has, by all accounts, claimed as her own over the course of her handful of visits to the stronghold.

Briefly, she finds herself somewhat underwhelmed. She knows better than most, of course, how the people behind tomorrow’s legends are just that, _people_ , first and foremost, but even so, she hadn’t expected the saviour of the Fifth Blight to cut such an unassuming figure. Brown hair pulled up into a ponytail with full bangs and a bit of braided affectation above narrow, sharply tapered ears, flattering yet practical, in line with the light armour she wears even in the middle of the afternoon. She’s facing away from Ellana, which likely doesn’t help, but the woman doesn’t stand out in the slightest, as much a part of the backdrop as Cabot, with whom she seems to be sharing a rather companionable silence, or the bowl of nuts she’s idly picking through when Ellana walks up.

“Warden-Commander Surana?”

The other woman turns only slightly at the address, but even that minor shift in perspective is enough to get Ellana to revise her early opinions somewhat. Her features are plain but pretty, angular and a little pinched on their own, but elevated into something more striking than they probably warrant through the tattoos and tints she sports. Bold blocks of black ink frame her face, vaguely evoking the idea of flames licking up the sides without actually portraying such, and maybe it’s just Ellana wanting to stick her own upbringing and culture upon others, but she can’t help but wonder if they mean anything. Her lips are dark (whether through makeup or being tattooed further, it’s difficult to tell), and it has the effect of pulling attention from her eyes, only lightly lined with kohl, a smudge of red shadow above being the only hint of colour about her, the only thing keeping her from looking thoroughly washed out. Yet somehow, it spite of all that… she still doesn’t stand out all that much.

Even her eyes themselves seem devoid of hue, a murky grey shade to them that seems to shift wildly based on light and angle, evidenced when they widen in surprise as she registers whose company she’s in and turns to face Ellana more fully.

“I-Inquisitor Lavellan, I presume?” The moment passes quickly, her features smoothing back into something befitting their casual surroundings as she nods her head in greeting.

“You presume correctly,” Ellana cheerily replies, eager to put the other woman at ease before she risks making things awkward. “May I join you?”

“Oh, o- of course,” Surana quickly assures her, gesturing to the stool next to her. “I mean, it’s your bar, isn’t it?”

“It’s everyone’s, actually, so I hope that’s not the _only_ reason you’re alright with it,” she teases lightly, since while the warden’s actions are nothing but welcoming, there’s a definite edge to her mannerisms that wasn’t there before Ellana spoke up. For all she knows, though, the woman could be like this with everyone save surly bartenders.

“Maybe so, but you’re the only one it’s named after,” Surana points out, the corners of her mouth turning up a touch in a hesitant, wry smile. “I think an introduction is probably long overdue, though. Please, sit.”

“You’re telling me,” Ellana says lightly, doing just that and gesturing to Cabot for a mug of her usual. “I was beginning to think that you were actually some elaborate practical joke everyone was playing on me. ‘Oh yes, the Hero of Ferelden was absolutely here, you _just_ missed seeing her yet again!’”

Surana has a subdued laugh over her drink at that. “The perils of running such a large organization, I suppose. Or of simply being a small part in it, for that matter.” She shrugs, grabbing another nut from the communal bowl, before seeming to turn apologetic. “I thought about seeking you out when I heard you returned, but then I didn’t want to bother you when you were still… I guess it doesn’t matter now, does it?”

“Not in the slightest,” Ellana assures her, a bit curious at both the sudden change in demeanor and the way it disappears just as quickly. A rather changeable woman, the one-time Warden-Commander, or at least that’s how it seems. “The first few days back are always a bit of a whirlwind.”

“I can imagine.”

They lapse into silence for a moment as Ellana gets her drink, and she wonders if she should try to make conversation or simply get right to the point when Surana speaks up again.

“I could never do it. All that you do, that is. It’s… rather remarkable, actually.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Ellana replies, shaking her head. She’s a little surprised by the remark, given who it’s coming from, but it’s nevertheless one she’s grown accustomed to. “There has to be a reason they wanted you for the job originally.”

“Has to be a reason I wasn’t around to get it, too,” Surana mildly counters, lips quirkly ever-so-slightly upward as she continues. “Surely the Herald of Andraste herself has to believe in fate?” Ellana can’t help making a face at that, to which Surana gives a good-natured chuckle. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be, that’s likely warranted,” Ellana admits, ducking her head on a smile. “But I assure you, other people do all the heaviest lifting around here. I just get to be the one standing in front of them all.”

“Noted,” says Surana, seemingly relaxed enough that Ellana figures she might as well just go for it, rather than beat around the bush. If she’s going to make things painfully uncomfortable, there’s little sense in dragging it out first.

“That’s… sort of what I wanted to talk to you about, actually.”

The other woman stills at that, and if Ellana had any doubts that she would know what this was going to concern, they go swiftly out the window.

“Oh?” asks the warden after a pause that’s only _slightly_ too long, making a rather concerted attempt at sounding casual.

“Not that I wouldn’t have made the effort to find you anyway, of course,” Ellana quickly adds, trying to course correct and not risk offending until it’s absolutely necessary. “As you said, this is long overdue.”

“Right, of course, how can I help you?” She’s all smiles, pleasant but to-the-point, waiting for the other shoe to drop now.

“I don’t know for certain that you can, to be quite honest, and, well, it’s not even my problem, exactly,” says Ellana, and she’s _really_ not trying to dance around the point so much, but she knows that she’s probably overstepping (or that someone in particular will think she is) and she at least wants to do so with as much tact as possible when she _really_ doesn’t have any of the details. “It concerns Commander Cullen.”

If Surana was a picture of stillness before, she may as well be a statue now, her expression shuttering completely save for a slight raise of her arched brows, utterly inscrutable. “Mm-hmm?”

Not making this easy for her, then. Fair enough. Wrapping both hands around her mug, Ellana barrels onward.

“I don’t quite know how to put this, but he was rather… out of sorts for quite some time following your last visit.” Does that sound like she’s angry with the other woman? Pinning the blame for her boyfriend’s bad mood on someone else? Creators, she hopes not. “Nothing extraordinary, mind you, and he got over it eventually, however he did mention having some sort of… row with you.”

Surana remains entirely motionless, placid and unreadable. Still waters with naught but the unknown happening below the surface. Whatever went on between them must have been worse than she thought. “Is that what he said?”

“Well, he didn’t say much of anything, truth to tell,” Ellana admits, trying to glean something, anything in the way of a measurable reaction from the warden. Unfortunately, she simply ends up babbling instead. “And honestly, that’s fine, I don’t need all the gory details of whatever it was that he said or did to offend you. I’ve been sort of assuming it all has to do with your… shared history, since that’s the only sort of thing that gets him to clam up like this, and I’m not about to pressure anyone to speak of things they don’t want to simply to satisfy my own curiosity. But…”

She trails off a bit, trying to pick the thread of her conversation back up when she notices Surana shaking her head minutely and yanks on the verbal reins to preemptively shut herself up.

“It wasn’t…” she starts before trying again, and only then does Ellana notice the woman’s fingertips quietly digging into a groove in the wood on top of the bar, her knuckles going white. “It’s not…” She stops. Sighs loudly. Is quieter when she speaks again, not quite a whisper, but not much more than one, either. “He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Right then. Ellana suspects this is simply Surana’s version of Cullen’s ‘not that simple’ nonsense, but this isn’t her place to speculate. This isn’t her place at _all_ , really, but she’s committed herself to a course of action now, and she’s going to see it through, for better or for worse.

“Oh, good! That should make what I have to ask of you easier, then.” Her tone is bright, but falsely so; she’s not pretending that she can’t tell the other woman would rather be anywhere else just now. “I take it you’re aware he’s not around at the moment?”

“I am aware, yes,” Surana lowly replies, no longer looking at her.

Ellana tries to tread carefully, picking her way delicately through her next words. “Then would I be incorrect in assuming you chose a time to stop by when that would specifically be the case?”

“Not… entirely incorrect, no.”

“Fair play. Well, the Commander is set to return from his business at Griffin Wing Keep in a week’s time, and while I’ve been told you were planning on leaving us shortly, I was wondering if I couldn’t convince you to stay a bit longer.”

Now _that_ gets a reaction. Surana turns her head to look at her like she’s grown an extra limb, eyes suddenly wide. Well, wid _er._

“To… what purpose, exactly?”

Ellana shrugs. “I don’t know, just… talk to him?” It sounds pathetic even as she says it, and she winces a little. “Obviously, you’re avoiding him for a reason, and if it’s too much to expect, then just say the word and I’ll drop it. I’d pretend this a matter of watching out for the Inquisition’s interests, ensuring my Commander’s personal problems don’t get in the way of business, but they say that you’ve grown rather close to some of the Chargers and they’re the biggest gossips here, so I’ll assume you know how things truly stand and won’t bother. I’m not asking you as the Inquisitor, I’m simply one person asking another that I barely know for a favour on behalf of someone else that I care _very_ deeply about. And if there’s nothing to forgive, then…”

Ellana doesn’t think she’s ever been so grateful to be cut off before.

“I thought you said he got over it.”

“Well, he stopped brooding about it constantly,” Ellana shrugs, huffing a sigh of her own. “But -- and I don’t know exactly how well you know him, he gave the impression that you’d become little more than a casual acquaintance -- but he’s not exactly the type to simply _stop_ letting things bother him.”

They both lapse into silence for a few moments before Surana speaks up in a slightly more conversational tone, seeming to find her voice again.

“To be honest, I don’t know that anything I could say to him at this point would do the trick, either.”

“I don’t know about that,” Ellana demurs, drumming her fingers against the side of her drink, seemingly in thought even though she’s long since worked out all of the things she wants to say here. “Cullen… for whatever reason, your opinion of him has _always_ mattered a great deal to him, even before you joined the Inquisition. And while I don’t know where it stands right now or what’s happened to damage it, if it’s at all in your grasp to-”

She’s a little less grateful to be cut off this time around.

“Inquisitor, with all due respect,” Surana starts off a little harshly before seeming to soften, slumping down a bit in her seat as her voice quiets once again. The woman’s moods are like the damn tide. “You don’t know what you’re asking for, here.”

Ellana sighs and lets that hang in the air for a moment, as it should. She knew this was going to be a long shot, and Surana’s likely a saint for putting up with her for this long. If only she knew what had happened, the scope of it, she might feel a little more content letting the matter rest, but that ship evidently sailed when she didn’t press Cullen on the matter, something she’s still fairly certain was the right decision.

“You’re right,” she finally replies, nodding once. “I don’t. But I had to try. Thank you for your time.”

She stands up to go, dejected but also oddly satisfied with the knowledge that she did what she could (and that Cullen probably won’t find out about her fruitless attempt to stick her nose in his business) when she feels a hand on her arm, light but insistent.

“You said he’ll be back soon?”

Can it be…?

“Yes.” She tries not to sound too excited. “He sent a raven yesterday, they’ll be here within a few days, a week at the outset.”

A pregnant pause, then, and Ellana finds herself holding her breath.

“I can’t promise anything.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to.”

Another pause, and Surana drops her hand. Nods once, looking grim.

“We’ll see. It was good to finally meet you, Inquisitor.”

Ellana returns the nod, and refuses to press her luck by responding further, just murmurs “Likewise,” and can’t help a small smile as she turns to leave. It’s not much, but it’s something.

She doesn’t miss overhearing the warden asking Cabot to bring her something harder, however.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm heading on vacation tomorrow (Coachella, woo!) and I really wanted to get this updated before I left, so hopefully it's not too hurried. See y'all on the other side!
> 
> NEXT TIME: Cullen and Surana finally reunite after their disastrous last meeting. Things were done, stuff was said, it was all very unfortunate, so surely things can't get any _worse_.


	11. The Higher Up You Go...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen and Neria's first post-Chess reunion. Part 1 of 2.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone, I usually save the blather for the end, but things have been super weird on my end lately, so I figured I'd get this out of the way quickly. The following chapter was written piecemeal in the following locales:
> 
> A long series of airports, because I travel as cheap as possible.  
> Sunny California fields while some of my favourite bands played.  
> The corner of a wind-tossed tent.  
> More airports.  
> Work, as usual.  
> The back of my boss's pickup truck as we fled the burning city I've lived in my whole life.  
> A tiny room in a work camp quite a ways north, staving off boredom while left stranded.  
> Another dang airport.  
> A series of couches and spare bedrooms belonging to extremely generous relatives, which is where I'm finally typing everything up!
> 
> I live in Fort McMurray, Alberta, google it if you're unaware of the current circumstances surrounding the area, but suffice it to say, this has been the strangest month of my life, and this looooong-overdue update will probably bear the scars of that! I've tried my best to wrangle it into something cohesive, but in the end, erratic conditions probably make for erratic fic, and I just hope this chapter was worth the wait. I missed this so much!

“So…”

“So.”

“That was….”

“Fucking excrutiating?”

Cullen laughs in spite of everything, prompting one of Neria’s small, private smiles before he replies. “Thank the Maker I wasn’t the only one.”

 

***

 

He’s having a nightmare. He has to be. That’s the only possible explanation for the torture he’s been enduring for the better part of an hour now. Surely the waking world can’t possibly be this cruelly perverse, short of demon involvement. Can it?

If only his nightmares usually contained so much… good cheer.

“And then this Avvar schmuck is left _staring_ at the stump where his arm used to be while Dorian and the boss just snicker about it from the back, it was _great!_ ”

The Iron Bull pounds a fist against their table to punctuate what Cullen supposes is the end of his story and he has to wrap a hand around his mug to keep it from rattling with the impact, trying not to frown too deeply in annoyance and give the game away entirely. Beneath the table, out of sight, Ellana gently squeezes his thigh, sensing his tension and responding without a second thoughta even as she laughs at Bull’s recollections. Instead of comforting, however, the intimate gesture only leaves him feeling ill.

Across the tables and the gap between them which the Iron Bull so artlessly, effortlessly bridges, Neria’s smile is utterly inscrutable.

She hasn’t looked at him once all night.

He’s almost relieved. Surely everyone present could read volumes in any gaze she might have for him.

Surely he’s the only one so ensared in confusion by her everything.

 

***

 

“That’s some woman you’ve got, Cullen.”

He winces, rubbing at the back of his neck and awkwardly glancing about the empty walkway. “She… means well, truly.” It isn’t Ellana’s fault that he’s so undeserving, and Neria shouldn’t be talking about her so.

Neria just smiles again, so different from the ones she dispensed with in mixed company, friendly and canny, but still almost shy. He remembers _those_ smiles from the Circle. Now the curves of her lips are subtle, knowing. For his interpretation and no one else’s. “That wasn’t sarcasm. She’s something else, and you’re a lucky man to have her. About the luckiest I think I’ve ever known.”

He’s not sure what to make of that. After all that he’s been through, he can’t very well disagree.

“And does that good fortune extend to keeping your acquaintance?”

Her smile fades.

“No. It doesn’t.”

His chest tightens sharply at that (he’s not sentimental enough to call the sensation ‘heartbreaking’), but he’s not in any position to protest beyond a stubborn clench of his fists at his sides to keep himself in check. And then she keeps talking.

“Good fortune has nothing to do with that.”

 

***

 

It’s odd, Cullen thinks. His emotions are in such a tumultuous churn, torn between his ever-present draw to the dark-haired beauty across the way and the urge to avoid her forever lest she ruin him utterly. Again. Twisted between the desire to take Ellana’s hand in his, find solace in her love, and the drive to shut her out for the fear (no, _knowledge_ ) that she’ll eventually discover the depth of his relationship with Surana. The morbid curiosity required to even attempt plundering those depths once again, to see how low they both can go, violently pitted against simple self-preservation, the need to save all that he’s built here for himself. The nagging truth that, were anyone present able to see past his mask of aggravated stoicism to the mess of a man underneath, they’d think him merely torn between two women, when that’s about the _last_ dilemma on his mind. He has more than enough directions to agonize over in his individual relationships to dare try pitting them against one another.

And yet, _and yet_ , with all that running roughshod around his consciousness, Cullen feels somehow numb to it all. Aware of it, but distant, watching the carnage from afar, the details fuzzy and indistinct.

Unreal. And so he chooses instead to focus on the real, the solid, the things he can analyze and know, with certainty and conviction.

Distances. About eight feet between himself and the Hero of Ferelden. But is that eight too many or thousands too few? 

Placements. She joined the group after Cullen was already there, seating herself at another table entirely, between Dalish and Grim, at an angle to Cullen’s corner seat but nevertheless facing him. She’s not _quite_ as physically far from him as she could be while still sitting with them, but she’s close. That has to be deliberate, right? Or is that just his ‘ridiculous vanity act’ again, making him think everything is about him?

Time. Cullen’s been seated for about 45 minutes now at Ellana’s insistence, excluding breaks to fetch more drinks. Neria’s been with them for perhaps two thirds of that, though the Chargers had seemingly been expecting her for some time already. She was hesitant to show herself tonight, too.

Attentions. She addresses everyone present but him. Even Ellana; he knows because of the way his stomach lurches hard every time. It’s clear that she's most familiar with the Chargers, the Inquisitor and Bull receiving rather more polite interactions in comparison, but she ignores nobody. Except Cullen. Then again, he’s not saying much her anyone to react _to_ , but even when he makes the odd attempt to participate in the conversation, she’s conspicuously silent. Surely the others must notice that.

Other details. How many times she’s laughed (eighteen), though always under her breath. The way she always sets her mug on the tray with the empties when new rounds are bought, yet her sips aren’t nearly big enough to drain a tankard that quickly. How every single fact he chooses to focus on is about _her_ when the warm hand on his leg should be the most real thing there is.

How he has to be about the shittiest person in Thedas to entertain this charade at all? No, no. Nothing objective about that one, best to move on.

One more round before he thinks he might be able to get out of there. Two storm-grey eyes watching everything in the room but him. Three elven mages, and once she teased him for having a type. Four hours since Ellana proposed this whole outing and a headache began to blossom beautifully behind his eyes. Five delicate fingers splayed against his thigh. Six strings on the lute being plucked as Maryden sidles over to sit on Krem’s lap. Seven minutes before people start singing and Cullen can no longer focus on mere data.

Everyone has to sing one song before they go. That seems to be the rule they come up with, likely just to delay his inevitable exit.

Maker’s breath. Surely he has to wake up soon.

 

***

 

“She tells herself that it’s all for him. Because she needs something else, and how will she ever save him if her own centre doesn’t hold?”

“Er… thank you, Cole. Do you know which way she went?”

“Who?”

Cullen sighs. “Never mind.”

 

***

 

“Neria, wait!” Cullen calls out, and as she freezes in her tracks, one foot on the first step leading up to the battlements, he’s struck by the most overwhelming sense of déjà vu.

The walls of Skyhold are a far cry from ancient Tevinter ruins, and the snow-dusted courtyard bears little resemblance to the Approach’s seemingly endless sands, but the rest of it… Her silhouette in the moonlight, the stiffness in her normally fluid motions, that invisible cord tied about his chest, dragging him helplessly after her in spite of the countless reason he has to turn away… It’s all exactly the same as that night in the desert, the resemblance almost painfully striking. Any moment now, she’ll wearily ask him what it is that he wants from her, and she’ll be right to do it, because after everything, even he still doesn’t know what--

“Walk with me?”

Cullen halts his own advance, blinking in a rather stunned fashion at her back. _That’s_ not how it went before.

Naturally, he doesn’t have time to contemplate the shift in attitudes. She’s moving again, ascending the stairs to the battlements, and he’s dutifully trailing after her, as always. Just like that.

 

***

 

She finally makes eye contact as she gets up to leave, and it feels like someone jabs a knife into Cullen’s chest. A stiletto right between the fourth and fifth ribs, just below his heart, it’s a look that says it all, and even then, it’s not enough for him.

It’s the glance of an instant, long enough only to slip the blade in and be gone, leaving him to try and interpret it while he bleeds out right there in the Herald’s Rest.

‘I’m just as lost here as you.’

‘You’re the only reason I’m even here, you fool.’

‘This isn’t over yet.’

Then there are the things that some part of Cullen _wants_ to read in her eyes but can’t. Because she’s taught him not to lie to himself, not about her.

‘I don’t forgive you.’

‘How dare you come here with her on your arm.’

‘I love you, too.’

Cullen inhales sharply through his nose, because Neria is long gone by this point, the playful jeers of the Chargers regarding her early exit already fading as Maryden begins another tune.

It’s Ellana sharply nudging him with her elbow that snaps him out of his trance. He stares at her openly for a long moment, wishing for one more chance to ask her to leave with him, take him away from all of this for the rest of the night, the rest of their _lives_ , but she’s looking at him with such stern expectation, mouthing the words ‘go after her’, and he knows that there would be little point.

A kiss on the cheek, fingers trailing gently down her arm in dim, desperate longing for her to save him from himself, and he’s gone.

He hears a snippet of her explaining his flight to the others (“some kind of tiff with her last time, you know how he gets”), and walks that much faster.

 

***

 

“Must we do this?”

“Go over this yet again? I’d really rather not, but if you insist…”

“Ellana, please, you know what I mean.”

A pause, then.

“Of course I do, and I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to. But really, is a few drinks with friends honestly so much to ask for?”

“For a certain value of the words friends, it is.”

“Oh, stop it, you’re the only reason she’s here at all, that has to mean she probably doesn’t hate you, doesn’t it?”

“No, _you’re_ the only reason she’s here at all.”

“Fair enough. I know you’re still cross with me about that even if you won’t admit it, and you have every right to be, but Cullen, what’s done is done, and now I’ll end up looking like a complete arse if I’ve gotten her to put off her own business just to have my Commander ignore her entirely.”

“Why should I care what she thinks of you? Particularly if it’s wrong.”

“First of all, don’t let Josephine hear you say things like that. Image is everything, and all. Secondly, perhaps you don’t care, but I do, at least to some extent. Us figureheads have to stick together, you know, I’d really rather not alienate the woman if I don’t have to.”

“Perhaps, but I’d… still really rather just spend the night in. With you.”

“Creators, you know how much trouble I have saying no to that face.”

“That’s the idea, yes.”

A longer pause this time. A sigh. A moan, quickly cut off.

“Come on. Just a few drinks. An _attempt_ at patching things up, for my sake. And then I’m all yours for the rest of the night.”

Resignation.

“I love you.”

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. I love you, too, now let’s go.”

 

***

 

“How have you been, Neria?”

“Ugh,” she groans in disgust, soundly unwinding any thread of confidence he’s managed to grasp hold of. “Please, don’t. I’ve been playing the right parts all night, don’t make me keep it up when it’s just us, Cullen. Can the small talk.”

“I… sorry,” he replies, wincing and rubbing at the back of his neck. When she puts it like that, the dismissal almost comes as a relief. “What should we talk about, then?”

“Do we have to talk at all?” she ventures, staring out over the battlements to the Frostbacks beyond as they stroll side-by-side, once-friendly colleagues attempting to reconnect and nothing more. “We only really have to kill enough time to placate your girlfriend, right? Once around the keep should do it.”

Cullen frowns and stops walking. “Is that the only reason you’re here? Placating the Inquisitor?” He knows that it’s nonsense the instant he says it. Surana doesn’t placate _anyone_ unless it otherwise suits her, and as he keeps talking, his voice seems to continually rise all on its own. “Convince her we made a token attempt and everything is wonderful now, job done, you can leave? Is that it? What _possible_ purpose could that serve? That can _not_ be why you waited for me to get back, why you sat through that charade in the pub for so long. Come off of it!”

Neria keeps walking, and Cullen flushes, caught unawares by the passion of his sudden outburst. Not only did he likely overstep whatever boundaries may remain between them, but they’re also very much visible to anyone with an eye to look, and he needs to take more care not to draw any undue attention. Rumours abound in Skyhold as it is.

“I-I’m sorry,” he says again, a telltale stammer creeping into his voice, but this time, she cuts him off, turning around to face him across the significant distance she covered while he was talking.

“Stop apologizing to me!” she exclaims in that sharply effective way she has of hitting every syllable in a rush without making her voice carry. It’s rather strident, giving her words the out-of-control quality of a long-held breath. “Honestly,” she goes on, keeping her distance, but finally, _finally_ staring him down as she runs surprisingly shaky hands through her immaculate hair. “What is _wrong_ with you? You’re the one who, for some mad reason only you and the Maker must know, dragged Lavellan into this, so it can’t just be about keeping your dick wet, and you _certainly_ have nothing to apologize for, so what are you even _doing_ here?”

Well, that was a rather roundabout way to get to the question he first expected from her (“What do you _want_ from me, Cullen?” and the desperate confusion in her voice resonated so sharply with his own, but fucking her in the middle of nowhere, unfortunately, isn’t an answer this time), but it’s the part before that which he gets truly hung up on.

“Nothing to apologize for?” The last time they met he left her savaged and _weeping_ , so hopefully he can be excused for how dumb he must sound now, his question lacking entirely in inflection. He’s too baffled for nuanced at the moment.

“Of course not,” she counters, though his confusion is apparently contagious, considering the way she drops her arms to her sides and regards him like he’s just proposed leaving the Inquisition’s military to become a spice trader. “What could you possibly… Cullen, what do you think happened when I was last here?”

He hesitates at that, because he tends to think that the whole experience rather spoke for itself, and he’s not particularly keen on hashing out the details. Since the only alternative is likely just going along with her initial plan of total silence, however, he closes the gap between them (why is he _always_ the one following her?), staying mindful of the sentries visible far down the walkway when he speaks again.

“I think you were going through some things,” he begins carefully with a colossal understatement, his words as slow and ponderous as his steps, as if she’s a horse he’s afraid of spooking. For her part, she merely regards his approach with wide, wary eyes as she finds a spot on the battlements to lean her weight. “I think that I knew that, going in. I think I was warned to be cautious and mindful of your feelings, and I wasn’t, because I got angry with you. You were in a bad way to begin with, and even if I still don’t know why, even if I didn’t mean to, I know that I took advantage of that. And I know that if I truly have nothing to apologize for, then neither do you.”

Under better circumstances, he’d be impressed with how steady he keeps himself. For now, his only concern is Neria and the hope that she can read his meaning well enough without him having to spell it out any further.

“You think you… took advantage of me?” she manages, a stunned, incredulous quality to her words as she frowns and looks down at her feet.

“I just wanted things to be simple between us so I ignored the signs,” he elaborates, trying and failing to catch her gaze once more. “And when it became clear I wanted something you were in no position to give me, I stayed anyway. I went along with it all, let things go too far, paid the price. So _yes_ , I do need to apolo-”

 ** _”Stop,”_** she says again, her voice gone hard as steel. At odds with her tone, though, is the way she then slides down the stone wall, keeping her back pressed to it until she’s sitting down right there, her knees tucked against her chest. It stuns him how small she can make herself look when she wants to. “Just… don’t do it. Maybe you’re right, maybe we should both apologize to each other, but I don’t fucking want it from you. And I can’t do it again, either.”

Cullen isn’t sure if he’s supposed to sit as well, so he just shifts his weight awkwardly from one foot to another, wringing the pommel of his sword beneath his hands as the memory of her last apology, called in ecstasy for long-irrelevant but surprisingly still-painful wrongs, rings in his mind.

“All right,” he finally says, ending his fidgeting with a simple shrug as she looks up at him with brows drawn sharply down.

“All right?”

“All right,” he repeats, and he’s not actually certain what exactly he’s agreeing to until he explains it. “I’m sorry, you’re sorry, or maybe you’re not; we likely both should be, but maybe it doesn’t matter. It’s done. No more apologies.”

She fucked him up so badly in the here and now that he nearly told Ellana _everything_ just to be rid of it, to get it _out_ of him, and in days long past, she did it just as surely, leaving him haunted by her for years. It seems wrong not to question or hold her accountable to any of it, gloss right on over what she put him through, but he’s been right there with her every step of the way, letting her do it to him, no matter how inappropriate he’s always known everything about them to be.

Maybe it’s awful, but why beg forgiveness for who they’ve always been?

“No more apologies,” she echoes quietly, as if trying the words out for the very first time. “Just like that? Then what?”

She’s still looking up at him, almost lost, and for once, he feels like the one with all the answers.

He offers her his hand to help her up.

“Walk with me?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really only broke this up into two parts to finally get this thing updated after a month, the conclusion will be coming soon, I PROMISE~


	12. ...the Further You Will Fall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reunited and it feels so... well not _good_ , necessarily, but definitely _something_. Part 2 of 2.

He’s agitated. More so than before, to a degree Ellana wouldn’t expect from something as simple as a woman he likes singing a sad song.

She bumps him gently with her elbow, but he’s having none of it, not just distracted but nearly enthralled even as a telltale crease appears above his eyes, that oh-so-Cullen precursor to a frown painted across his brow.

Perhaps agitated is the wrong word. He’s been on edge all evening, full of nervous energy (and understandably so, but every time Ellana feels a twinge of guilt about forcing him into this situation, she remembers the seemingly endless hours of morose silence she had to snap him out of and knows that this is for the best), but that seems to have given way to a more concrete unease in the last few minutes. There’s a sharpness to his careful, deliberate motionlessness now, like he’s anticipating a blow as opposed to weathering a storm.

Perhaps Ellana underestimated the depths of Cullen’s lingering feelings for the woman. 

Possibly there are reasons beyond the obvious ones keeping him from elaborating about their history. 

Maybe Surana is the whole reason Cullen was drawn to her in the first place, even if Ellana is hard-pressed to find similarities between herself and the Hero of Ferelden beyond ‘elf’, ‘mage’, and _possibly_ ‘famous’.

Certainly Ellana is just searching for any little thing to unsettle herself with, now. If her man is upset, she should be, too? Is that the logic at play, there? Ridiculous.

She’s not even that good a singer. Is that overly judgmental? Probably, but music and song is the one avenue of Ellana’s life that she values most highly, the one where she knows her own talents so well, that she feels justified in making such calls, at least to herself. Even if it feels catty.

Surana carries a tune well enough and definitely has an ear for music, but her voice is a little too weak to stand out, wavering unsteadily on the low notes and fading on the high. Had she chosen to belt a bawdy tavern cheer like everyone else at the table, it would hardly have mattered, but when her turn came around, she instead launched into a slow, sweet ballad of tragic love, putting all of her weaknesses as a vocalist on stark display.

If her goal was the be drowned out by the din of the bar, she’s failed slightly, as a dutiful hush seems to have fallen over the assembled soldiers and mercenaries, though no one outside of their immediate surroundings actually seems to be paying them any mind. And nobody maintains the same degree of worshipful silence that emanates from Cullen, still at her side.

It’s a rather pretty song, all things considered, but almost unbearably sad, and while Ellana makes a point of committing the melody to heart, she likewise does her best to forget the attendant lyrics as soon as she’s heard them and processed the tale of a man whose all-consuming love for a woman only went unrequited until he drank himself to death over her, at which point she picked up his fallen torch and did the same.

“Creators, what _is_ it?” Ellana hisses under her breath, as much to distract herself as to get to the bottom of Cullen’s fresh tensions. “Sad or no, it’s just a song.”

Cullen’s gaze, heavy yet still somehow unfocused, snaps over to her after only a slight delay, and for a moment, he almost looks surprised to see her sitting there. Then, after yet another odd pause where his thoughts seem to play catch up with his senses, he _really_ surprises her.

He smiles, crooked and a little sheepish once his pre-frown has had a chance to fade. The one he gives her when he’s been caught in something but isn’t actually upset about it.

She’s missed that smile.

“Nothing is ‘just a song’ to you, love,” he knowingly whispers back, and Ellana has to grin. He knows her too well. Songs have saved the world before.

“Fair enough, but we’re talking about you,” she counters easily. “What gives?”

“Nothing gives,” he begins with a slightly stubborn bent, but his protestations die quickly as the music swirls about them, Maryden’s gentle accompaniment aiding the atmosphere muchly. “It’s just…” he trails off momentarily, and here that almost-shy smile of his returns as his voice drops even further, his whisper turning secretive, conspiratorial. “I know this song.”

Oh, for… 

Of all the absurd things to be cautious of spreading around.

“What?” Ellana asks with mock affront that quickly gives way to a fond laugh. “But I thought you only knew Chantry hymns, this one doesn’t even _mention_ the Maker.”

“Now that’s not-” Cullen starts before giving up in the face of her teasing laugh and the press of her body as she playfully leans into him. If Surana notices or cares about their distraction, her voice doesn’t reflect it in the slightest.

Wait…

“Does she know you know it?” Could that be behind the unusual choice of tune? It hasn’t escaped Ellana’s notice that the other woman has paid Cullen next to no mind all night despite ostensibly being there for his sake; might this be some sort of peace offering?

Cullen shrugs helplessly, and it becomes immediately clear that he’s been wrestling with that very question for some time now. Since the beginning of the song, likely.

“I don’t see how she could,” he finally replies, shaking his head once. “It was rather popular in Kirkwall, that’s all.”

“Why am I not surprised by that,” Ellana deadpans before brightening. The most miserable musical leanings of the most miserable piece of the Marches is hardly the point here. “What are you waiting for? Join in!”

“What? No, I couldn’t, don’t be ridiculous,” he replies in automatic protest, a mite too quickly.

“Whyever not? No one else has been shy about chiming in when they know the words to something, she could hardly mind. Besides, nobody here is letting you go without a song, tagging along on the Warden-Commander's just makes practical sense. You’ll be free that much sooner!”

“The song’s nearly half over,” he points out under another lilting, melancholy chorus.

“Even sooner, then.”

Cullen narrows his eyes in cross annoyance at the inescapable logic of her words, causing her to beam that much more brightly at him in response.

Then, without breaking eye contact, he begins to sing.

 

***

 

“Where did you learn that song?”

“What song?”

“Andraste’s Mabari,” Cullen dryly replies before snapping irritably. “What song do you think?”

“Well, I don’t know, you throw something like that at me out of the clear blue, who knows?” Neria ineffectually deflects, though there’s a slight smile colouring her huff. “There’s nothing wrong with a little specificity. I heard it around recently, liked it, what more do you need?”

“Because _that’s_ so specific,” Cullen counters, only barely resisting the urge to roll his eyes because she’s obviously doing it on purpose. He doesn’t drop the issue, however, even at the risk of ruining a silence that had only barely lapsed into companionable prior to his speaking up. She wouldn’t be so odd and evasive about such a minor thing if he weren’t on to something. “Besides, the sky is clear black right now. How recently?”

She turns to look at him over her shoulder from where she leans (rather worryingly, though he won’t say as much) against a crumbling bit of masonry that his men haven’t gotten around to fixing yet, and her expression is infuriatingly inscrutable. Part amused, part disbelieving, part _sad_ , eyebrows quirked unevenly upward. Gaze distant even while looking right at him. Eventually, she shrugs and turns back to face the open air.

“A couple of months, I guess. Why do you ask?”

Cullen means to get angry with her willful, naked ignorance, but when he opens his mouth, what instead comes out is a quiet, heartfelt, “No games, Neria. _Please.”_ The time for anger is long past, if there ever truly was one.

She doesn’t reply for a long moment, and when she does, she doesn’t move. “Who’s playing?”

As frustrating a response as that is, Cullen refuses to rise to the bait, instead curling his fingers into a fist for a count of four and releasing them before trying again.

“It’s just that the only times I’ve ever heard that song before, sung exactly like that, were in a certain few taverns in Kirkwall. Something of a local favourite, as I recall.”

For a few vain seconds, Cullen hopes that he’s wrong, that he’s misconstrued the information he has, missed some crucial bit of context and made connections where there truly are none to be made. With the excruciating pauses Neria continues to take before deigning to speak to him, he’s got plenty of time for his prayers to go unheeded.

“Then I guess that must be where I heard it.”

Something in Cullen’s chest lurches at the blithe confirmation of what he’s known since before he left the Herald’s Rest. But even if he’s long since put the puzzle pieces all together, he seems unable to actually make sense of the picture they reveal without having her say it out loud, first.

Maybe he’s just tired of her telling him important things through careful inferences and deliberate, calculated obfuscations, causing his mind to finally rebel. Maybe he just wants to hear the truth from her, no matter how much it hurts.

No matter the reason, the result is that his thoughts refuse to acknowledge the obvious while nevertheless providing him with all the right questions to advance the narrative.

“You asked around about me, then?” He’s never been much of a social creature, but she was specifically in his old haunts.

She visibly bristles at that, back straightening just enough to be noticeable before she turns to look at him, back to the wall once more, with a slightly worried expression.

“That wasn’t why I was there, if that’s what you’re thinking. Just… figured since I was in your old neighbourhood and all, I’d…”

She trails off, and Cullen belatedly realizes that his posture is a little on the imposing side. It’s mostly by default, partly in defense, and he uncrosses his arms in a hurry before moving to stand against the wall as well, facing Neria with just enough space between them for it to still be called friendly.

“It’s all right, I wasn’t-- I’m not--” Cullen stumbles over the words, unsure of both why he wants so badly to reassure her that it’s fine, and of why it so completely _isn’t_. He sighs heavily, taking a moment before trying again.

“You can’t believe everything you hear there.” As if the unvarnished truth of all that happened up north wasn’t awful enough in places.

“I know. I didn’t,” Neria says, the words coming slowly, as if she’s just as puzzled by this line of questioning as he is. “I don’t.”

Cullen is struck, then, by the observation that she’s the only woman he’s ever known who is prettiest when she’s frowning, and the thought is so out of place that he’s suddenly lost for any sort of proper reply.

 _Why_ is he so unsettled by this? She’s far from the first person to work with the Inquisition who’s had knowledge of his actions in Kirkwall, and hers is second-hand at best. She isn’t even the first person to work with the Inquisition who’s had knowledge of his actions in Kirkwall that he’s _slept with,_ and yet…

And yet this feels, if not like a violation (his life has been far less of a closed book than he’d like, after all), then similarly wrong in ways he can’t pinpoint.

Until he can. Until she looks back down past the broken ramparts and bites the inside of her mouth, causing one tattooed cheek to hollow slightly, and he understands. Because she’s waiting for him to put it all together. Because she wants him to. Because if their last meeting was about apologies, then this one is about explanations for them, and she apparently needs him to force both out of her.

Just the facts, then. Prior to her last trip to Skyhold, she apparently paid a visit to Kirkwall, and whatever she heard or saw there (honestly, Cullen doesn’t even care about the specifics) left her feeling so guilty that she was willing to put them both through a wringer to make him see it. And Cullen, for his part, had to go and make things worse in the process.

Neria Surana may not be the only person in his life who has an uncomfortable familiarity with his past, but she _is_ the only one who blames herself for it.

It’s not the full picture — he doubts he’ll ever truly have one of those where she’s concerned — but it’s enough, and his next words come to him while he’s still struggling to figure out what the right ones could possibly be.

“How can you still want me?”

It’s something of a gamble, seeing as she hasn’t actually confirmed any desire to rekindle their after-hours activities. She was willing to see him, willing to make the effort and invite communication, if not initiate it, and that’s it. Still, for her to be so horrified by the man he was (is?), it feels like the right question to ask.

If she seemed puzzled before, this manages to utterly bewilder Neria, but her voice is tight in spite of the confusion in her eyes.

“How did you _ever_ want me?”

That probably is the better question, they never _should_ have wanted each other, but from Neria, it’s staggering in its implications. Whatever she heard about him was heinous enough to leave the indomitable Grey Warden reeling, but even back when he blamed her, he didn’t _really_ blame _her._ And the notion of her internalizing such a thing for so long leaves him wanting nothing more than to pull her to him, hold her close, cradle her face between his hands and tell her everything she didn’t want to hear from him last time.

He isn’t her fault.

His fingertips twitch at the effort of _not_ reaching out for her, and he nearly has to turn away before she beats him to it.

Back to walking, then. It’s not as if he has any explanations of his own.

None that he can give her in public, anyway.

 

***

 

It’s hardly difficult to remember that Cullen has a lovely singing voice, but it’s far easier to forget how affected Ellana always feels by it when he only deigns to use it when he’s got a really good reason to. She can count the instances she’s actually heard more out of him than idle humming on one hand, and it always leaves her a little bit breathless when she does.

A gentle tenor rises over the now-distant din of the tavern, blending with the willowy alto of the moment, and if it lacks in strength, it’s only because he lacks in confidence (in this, and little else).

His eyes don’t leave Ellana’s as everyone within earshot immediately shuts up in surprise (all but Surana, naturally) and a slight flush creeps up his cheeks at the attention. For fear that he’ll get cold feet and stop if she doesn’t, Ellana holds his gaze, her smile encouraging even as he sings of a man killed by heartache and buried in a grove.

The overall effect is rather remarkable, all told. Perhaps it’s just her own biases showing, but Surana has a voice meant for harmonies, and Cullen’s voice sweetens her tone considerably. Not that Ellana can be much bothered to care about anyone else when he’s looking at her like _that,_ mind, all quiet intensity and attempts to keep his focus turned inward while simultaneously putting himself out there in more ways than one.

For the moment, only the two of them exist, and for one brief, inexplicable moment as she takes his hand in hers beneath the table, Ellana is utterly terrified for the song to end.

It passes as the chorus swells one final time.

The power of good music, she supposes.

 

***

 

“So about… about what I said before. N-near the end,” Cullen finally starts, and Maker strike him down, he can _not_ begin stammering now. This has been the metaphorical giant in the room all night, and if they’re to have any manner of relationship going forward, it can’t remain that way, three dark words looming over everything.

In a way, he’s glad he waited so long to broach the topic, because while he still isn’t even sure if the sentiment was real or not, he _has_ decided that he doesn’t want to apologize for saying it. With that option taken cleanly off the table for the time being, he’s off the hook for his lack of regrets, if only for this one supremely questionable thing.

“It’s fine,” Neria curtly says, and Cullen first thinks she’s being sharp and perfunctory because she’d rather not talk about it, either. There’s something sympathetic in her eyes, though, which doesn’t quite track with that.

“Fine?” he echoes, dumbly surprised.

“Of course,” she assures him, curtness giving way to about the most reassuring smile he’s ever seen on her. “You didn’t mean it, any of it. The whole night was a mess. It’s fine, no harm done.”

No harm done. Then why do his chest and throat suddenly feel so tight?

With such a clear out, however manufactured, given to him, Cullen would be a fool not to take it, heedless of his true feelings on the matter (which, again, even he still isn’t certain of), so he means to return her smile, laugh the whole embarrassing business off, and just move on from it, at least until they’re a bit more settled.

Somehow, though, any manner of agreement he can come up with suddenly tastes like ashes coating his tongue, choking him and refusing to come out. What he does instead is ask, in a painfully small voice, “Would it truly be so impossible if I did? Mean it?” Then, hoping that actually voicing the damnable words might rob them of some of their power over him, “Love you?”

They’ve certainly seemed to mean less coming out of his mouth lately in other circumstances, after all.

Her reply is as crushing as it is brief.

“Yes. It would.”

There’s a bit of edge to her voice as she says it, a hardening tone, but her demeanour doesn’t otherwise change any. She’s firm, but not unkind, and Cullen understands.

This isn’t her own personal read of the situation, her interpretation of his feelings for her. She’s laying out the facts, telling him the truth.

What she _needs_ to be the truth. There simply (it’s never simple) are no other options, and nothing he can say will change that.

It takes every ounce of Cullen’s considerable physical strength just to lift his shoulders in a shrug, the corners of his mouth drawn tight in an obvious attempt at keeping a neutral expression.

“Then I suppose I didn’t mean it.”

Her smile relaxes, and this time, it reaches her eyes.

 

***

 

“Hey, Boss. Can I ask you a personal question?”

“Of course, Bull, you know me. The more painfully uncomfortable, the better.”

“See, that’s why I love you when you’re drunk.”

“Liar. You love me all the time.”

“Me and most people you meet, true. Even so… Aren’t you a little bit worried? Seeing Cullen run off after the warden like that?”

“Should I be?”

“Well… Look, it’s probably not my place to say, but seeing him tonight, he’s… You know, kinda…”

“Smitten with her?”

“So you did notice.”

“Bull, please. I may not be a former spy, but I didn’t exactly fall in love with Cullen for his subtlety.”

“And you’re not worried?”

“Are you?”

“About Cullen? Yeah, kinda, did you see the way he took off after her? Trying so hard to look casual, but-”

“No, about the Chargers.”

“…Why would I be worried about them?”

“They were awfully chummy with Surana, weren’t they? I mean, Bull, they’ve got _in-jokes._ Aren’t you afraid they’re going to abandon you to run around the world going on adventures with her, instead?”

“That’s not the sa- Okay, point taken.”

“You just know she and Skinner have gotten up to all sorts of mischief while you’ve been away. And Grim nearly said an entire word to her tonight!”

“I said point taken.”

“I trust him. If that stopped being true just because some old flame he’s clearly not yet over is around, then it never counted for much in the first place, did it?”

“Heh. Guess not. I just worry about you, is all. Know you’ve been burned before.”

“Doesn’t mean I should never light a fire again.”

“But you should probably be more careful when you do.”

“Bull? Hush.”

“Hushing.”

“I trust him.”

 

***

 

As he presses Neria against the dusty wall of an isolated tower that's been used for storage (not isolated enough by half, though, and every nerve in his body is screaming at him to _stop),_ Cullen is struck by how one-sided their kisses tend to be.

Only one of them ever seems to initiate things. Either Neria will lay into him a gentle seduction until he gives in and can no longer deny how much he wants her and all trace of hesitance gets washed away, or his own passions will get the better of him all in a rush and Cullen will surprise her into submission, rough and needy and claiming. And beyond that, once an encounter between them is properly under way, they rarely kiss at all. Stare into each other’s eyes, sure; share heated breath, absolutely; but kiss? Not so much, unless it serves an overt purpose.

This time, though. This time, it’s different.

This time, they meet each each other in the middle.

A mutual leaning in and coming together as they happened to pass through of the sheltered spaces that pepper the ramparts, quickly giving way to something rather more involved as her arms twine around his neck, hands fisting in his surcoat and mouth molding against his again and again.

Maker, does he _want_ to get caught? Because it’s bound to happen at any moment, and yet, _and yet,_ he can’t seem to pull himself away from her. It’s wrong, so wrong, and deadly dangerous, his senses all in a panicked scramble, but stopping right now feels utterly impossible. Like he needs to be kissing her, needs that slick, tangible, physical confirmation that this thing, this heat between them wasn’t as destroyed as he thought it was, that it isn’t over yet (one day it will be, it has to be, but not just yet). Like he needs it as surely as he needs food and air and faith.

He’s just so _relieved._ Neria is ruining his life in so many different ways, but at least now, he can feel like he’s doing something about it again. Before, when he was floating in that awful, angry limbo without her, he was helpless, lost and scared and lashing out (until he wasn’t, until he was just fine again, but he’s not thinking about that now). This is better. It’s not _good,_ but it’s better.

Or is it? Cullen knows this isn’t the first time he’s likened her to an addiction in his own mind, not even the first time he’s associated her with lyrium, but never has the connection felt as clear as it does now. Maker, he even met her right after he began taking the stuff.

He feels brilliant when he’s with her, only for it to all come crashing down as soon as they’ve parted. With her, however, also goes the temptation, and without _that,_ ultimately, he winds up feeling fine, if incomplete (aside from the guilt, of course, which only joins the droning background noise of it that permeates his life, anyway). If he never saw again after this, it would hurt for a while, just as it did so long ago, but he’d get over it. With Ellana by his side, it would prove easier than ever.

But he _will_ see her again. She keeps being pushed into his life as surely as the singing blue shipments he insists on personally keeping inventory of. And even if she destroys his life as totally as the lyrium eventually would have, even if he runs out of reasons to justify using her like this for his own unreachable ends, even if this _will_ all end in disaster…

Quitting his lyrium draughts was supposed to be a death sentence. He simply doesn’t have the strength to deny the both of them forever.

She was right. He must not have meant it. How could that possibly be love?

Whatever it is, it feels damnably desirable in the moment either way, and right before it ends, Cullen can hear himself moaning softly as her tongue twists lithely around his own, his hands gripping her hips as they rock against each other in a slow rhythm even if it’s impossible to find any proper purchase while they’re both wearing armour.

Only then, when the silence is broken by more than heavy breaths and the shifting of her mail between the weight of his body and the wall, does Neria do what Cullen is incapable of doing, what _needs_ to be done, breaking the kiss and pushing him away from her, gentle but insistent as she catches her breath and sneaks a quick glance about them to ensure that their minimal privacy remains intact.

For a long moment, nobody speaks. Then:

“Good talk, Cullen.”

He laughs, the spell broken for now, and steps back to a respectable distance. Still, even with the air between them significantly clearer, something feels off. More broken than usual. Maybe they’ve opened the door to continuing things, but nothing’s been fixed, and with a sudden bolt of uncharacteristic clarity where the two of them are concerned, Cullen knows that if they leave things like this, any forward momentum they have will be lost, never to be regained. She’s told him before that she isn’t willing to work for this beyond showing up (and even that couldn’t have been easy this time around), so if Cullen truly doesn’t want to lose this (and he _can’t,_ not before he gets what he needs), it’s going to be on him to force the issue.

Once again, he lays out the facts. After all that was said, all they did, a distance remains between them. If she leaves Skyhold before they can deal with it, it’s only going to widen and grow insurmountable, assuming it already isn’t. He needs to consummate their reconciliation if he wants it to take, and since they’ve taken to using sex as the means to unraveling all the trickier aspects of their relationship, that means getting her alone. Properly.

“Stay,” he says, quiet again as he breaks the tension only he seems to see, so much so that her brief, stunned silence seems deafening by comparison.

“What?”

He pushes on, stronger now in his convictions. If he lets her go now, this will all have been for nothing.

He’ll have betrayed Ellana for _nothing._

“Ellana-- The Inquisitor will be leaving again in only a few days, we get so little time together, and I- I know that you’ve already extended your visit here once on my behalf, but… Stay? A bit longer?”

The incredulous smile that slinks slowly across her features is not Cullen’s favourite.

“You… Wow. _Wow._ Let no one ever say that you lack for nerve, Rutherford.”

Convictions, don’t fail him now.

“I just… I feel like if you leave now, it won’t be the same when you next return. I need to see you alone again before that happens.”

Neria remains unimpressed, but now seems more tired than actually angry at the suggestion. He’s not certain whether or not that’s a good thing; at least anger denotes a certain amount of passion.

“And does it not occur to you that hanging around here with nothing to do while you fuck your girlfriend every night isn’t exactly something _I_ need?”

“I’ll end it with her, then. Tonight.” The words are out before he can process them, and Cullen instantly regrets every one, but he’s not thinking, desperate to get her to stay, whatever it takes. Lying to her, breaking his own heart, _anything._

Fortunately, her immediate dismissive scoff quells much of his rising horror.

“Don’t you dare. Everyone saw you leave that bar after me, if you and Lavellan suddenly end up on the outs, I’d be strung up by sunrise. I’m _really_ not interested in becoming the local pariah. Thanks for the generous offer, though.”

It’s a frustratingly obvious bit of logic that is apparently beyond his capabilities to see right now, but if it’s the only thing stopping him from blindly committing himself to utter ruination, he’ll accept it. It still doesn’t help his immediate problem, however.

“What, then? What do you need?”

Neria sighs, and Cullen takes a step toward her in supplication before she puts her hands up slightly, subtly warns him away. They’ve pushed their luck too much already and can’t afford another lapse in judgment.

“I need… I don’t know what I need anymore. I need to get out of this place, I have more than overstayed my welcome, I need…” She trails off, and maybe it’s wrong, but Cullen always feels oddly grateful for those occasional reminders that she’s just groping her way through this, too.

He suspects that they have more in common than either of them quite realize.

“You need this, too,” says Cullen, forcing himself to sound confident when he’s anything but. “I know it.” He drops his voice, but keeps his distance, letting the weight of his presumptions bridge the gap between them. “You wouldn’t keep coming back if you didn’t, there’s no way. So stay. Just a few days, please. Then we can work things out, _really_ work them out. That’s all I can offer.” And once more, for good measure. _“Please.”_ If he’s laying it all out there, he may as well commit.

“What do you think this is? We’re not _dating,_ Cullen, there’s nothing to _work out,”_ she spits, suddenly harsh, but the fight goes out of her as quickly as it arrived and Cullen stands his ground, saying nothing, even if he’s all nerves like he was at the start of the evening.

Eventually, she speaks again, and he knows that he’s got her.

“I’ll think about it, all right?”

“Thank you.”

“I’m not promising anything, now.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to.”

Well, shit. And he’d been doing so well. For whatever reason, that was apparently the precise wrong thing to say, with Neria screwing her face up in sudden, surprising displeasure before immediately turning to go. She doesn’t take back her non-promise to make the attempt, however, so Cullen decides not to press any further than he already has.

She certainly wasn’t wrong about the nerve of him.

The last thing she says before disappearing back out onto the battlements is simply “Stop by your quarters before heading back to the tavern. Your hair’s a mess.”

And Cullen’s life resumes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So THAT was a long-ass wait between chapters, life since the evacuation ended has been... weird. It's been a weird summer all around, that's all I've got. Thanks to anyone still sticking by me, since massive delays or no, I'm probably not gonna be done with this story for a long, long while. Cheers!


	13. He Said/She Said (No Alarms and No Surprises)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen and Neria work some things out. AKA The Talky Chapter. Rating: E.

“You stayed.”

“So it would seem.”

“I didn’t know if you would.”

“Neither did I.”

 

 

His kiss is gentle, when he pulls her to him. A slow caress of lips as he brings his hands up to cup her face between them. It’s a bit of a reversal for them, but she responds in kind, and after a few moments, the nagging sense that he’s having to try too hard to pour feeling into the kiss begins to retreat. He’s trying to make a point, he thinks, even if he has no clue what it might be.

 

 

_Twenty-four hours earlier, he’s got her laid out against satin sheets (she’s gotten rather accustomed to some of the finer things, for a Dalish) and he’s holding her close, so close that nothing else can matter. Not tomorrow, not the danger that always awaits her, not the fact that it will be weeks before they’ll get to see each other again._

_Not what he’ll do in the interim._

_None of it._

_They’ve already tired each other out making mad, passionate (and rather loud) love in their desperation to savour their last night together, and now they’ve settled on a slower, more intimate pace, just enjoying each other and staving off the inevitable._

_He enters her at an angle, holding one flexible leg up near her head while the other wraps tightly around his own. His strokes are measured, pressing in as deeply as he can without hurting her, moving just fast enough that neither of them quite get a chance to properly catch their breath._

_And he never stops kissing her._

_Never._

 

 

“Wait,” he murmurs against her mouth when she pulls his hips against her body, pressing into him before drawing back, confused. She doesn’t ask what’s wrong, but she does wait for him to tell her. “That’s it? We just… go back to normal, after all that?” It doesn’t feel right.

She smiles, reaching up to brush a bit of his hair back, even if he knows no part of it is out of place. “Oh, Cullen. There was never a normal for us to begin with.”

That’s fair, he supposes. “Even so. We should talk.”

Her smile fades a bit at that and she draws back a bit further. “If all you wanted to do was talk to me, you wouldn’t have waited so long to get me alone again. I swear, if you’re going frigid on me after making such a fuss…” She’s back in the Orlesian robe she used to wear for him (and _that’s_ presumptuous, she very likely just wears it for herself and sometimes he happens to show up), purple so dark it looks nearly black, and he wants to run his hands along the slippery fabric, feel the warmth of her through it, and _forget._ But he can’t, not yet. Ignoring their problems is just another form of lying, isn’t it?

“Well that’s obviously not _all_ I want to do, but I’m sure we both still have things we need to say.”

She scoffs. “Speak for yourself. I thought we already cleared the air far more than I ever expected to.”

“I’d love to,” he stubbornly replies, before realizing that his point may have gotten a bit buried in his retort. “Speak, that is. For myself.”

For a second, he sees something that might be amusement in her eyes, but it quickly disappears, giving way to annoyance, bordering on anger. “Well, I didn’t stick around this long to hear anything out of you more complicated than moans. Why is this so bloody important that it had to wait?”

Seeing as he really _does_ want to talk, he goes ahead and lets himself do so, without actually thinking about the words first. Only with her should he be able to do that. “Because after last time, I’m a little bit afraid of you. Of how you might react to me. And I don’t want to be.”

Her eyes widen a bit, and after what she’s told him, what she _blames herself for,_ he knows that that has to cut deep. But it’s the truth, and that’s what she purports to want from him, isn’t it? Just as long as it’s a truth she can handle. Either way, he saves her from having to reply.

“But hey,” he goes on with a quick shake of his head, undoing the laces on his shirt and pulling it off while dredging up from somewhere deep in his soul that one smirk he’s always been told makes women melt, “surely we’re both fairly good at multi-tasking?”

 

 

She doesn’t quite melt, but she certainly softens. Maybe it’s the earnestness of his request, or maybe she’s just glad that he’s got his shirt off, but either way, she seems a little more accepting of his non-carnal demands then she was at first.

“Tell me you want this,” he murmurs between kisses, the words just a heated brush against her lips while her hands roam across his chest and he slowly undoes the sash holding her robe closed.

“I want this,” she replies with an almost imperceptible nod of her head, her voice small and somehow pained. He feels a little bad for pressing such a matter, but he needs to distance her as much as possible from the _images_ in his head, long-buried but never quite deep enough. He’d managed to never associate them with her in the here and now until she forced the issue (that was another her, another him, another lifetime, until it suddenly, violently _wasn’t),_ and he needs to get that back before he can lose himself in her properly again. “Of course I want this, Cullen, I want you.”

Good. That’s good. If he can focus on all the ways they’re _actually_ thoroughly fucked up instead of all the ways they never really were, he’ll be just fine.

“For the same reasons as before?” he asks, and he can sense her slight hesitation while he peppers kisses across one tattooed cheek, up to an elegant ear.

“What do you mean?”

He lets his voice drop to a whisper. “Do I still not matter?”

Her fingers creep up to rest on his shoulders, digging in slightly. “Neither of us do.”

“Okay,” he replies, pausing in his activities for one brief moment before he nods his head and resumes. “Okay.”

He pushes the robe off of her shoulders to pool at her feet before they tumble into bed together.

 

 

_Twenty-four hours earlier, she snuggles against him in blissed-out aftermath, and he can’t comprehend how such perfect moments can actually exist._

_For him. For anyone._

_Nor can he determine why he should be so set on destroying such perfection as soon as he has it._

_“Mmm, another round?” she asks, love in her voice as he gives a huff of surprise._

_“Maker’s breath, Ellana, you ride out at dawn. You’re going to be exhausted!”_

_She wiggles at his side, some odd blend of playful and sultry._

_“Not as exhausted as I could be.”_

_All he can do at that is laugh and dive back beneath the covers._

 

 

He’s still dressed from the waist down as they move together, rocking against one another and just feeling each other out again. He hardly minds; he’s in absolutely no rush tonight, wanting to do this right for once. He isn’t even all that hard yet. For all his noble justifications that he’s doing this for reasons other than sex, he simply comes and goes far too often.

No longer.

“Did you ever hate me?”

He feels her tense up in confusion and eases off a bit, ducking his head against her neck to gently suck kisses into her pulse point.

“What?”

“Did you ever hate me?” he repeats himself precisely. It’s a simple enough question, he thinks. There’s not much more clarification to be given.

“I… I told you last time, I didn’t…” she replies, clearly unsure even as her hands tangle in his hair like she needs something to hold on to.

“That was last time,” he mumbles against her skin. Patient. “This isn’t last time. Is it?”

“I… no. No, it isn’t.”

“Good.” He doesn’t let up with either body or words. “So answer the question.”

“No. No, I don’t hate you, Cullen.”

He shakes his head, still tucked against her neck. “That’s not what I asked.”

“That’s not…” she echoes before tugging him up by the hair, gentle but insistent until she can look him in the eyes. “No. I never hated you. Better?”

He meets her gaze for a long moment, trying to decide. “Better.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I believe that you believe it.” Again with the not thinking before he speaks. Again with the not being able to regret it, so long as it gets him a reaction.

“Cullen…”

“Why did you want to punish me? You said it was a punishment, before, making me want you. Punishment for what?”

_“Cullen…”_

It’s difficult to tell if she’s protesting his question, or just responding to the way he rolls his hips against hers as he asks it. Everything’s a bit conflicting at the moment, so he tries to help her along a bit.

“Just for being me?”

“Yes,” she whispers, closing her eyes, her naked body continuing to move against him as she lets the words take her over. “For who you were. Because you were there, and you were sweet, and I have forgotten more about your family than I _ever_ knew about my own. You were completely oblivious and I h-”

She trails off, a tense exhalation, breathy and choked. “Say it.”

“I hated you for it.” She opens her eyes again, angry again. “Is that what you want to hear? Does that make you happy?”

He feels oddly unfazed by that. “If it’s the truth.”

Her expression immediately softens, and she raises her head until her forehead touches his, eyes closed once more. “I don’t know, okay? I’ve never known with you. None of it’s ever made any sense to me.”

She’s here for the same reason as he is. She’s just looking for answers, too. He can’t help but smile.

“Neria…”

“Fuck me. Please, Cullen. Just fuck me?”

Well. Since she’s asking so nicely.

“Turn over.”

 

 

“I was weak.”

“By the Maker, Cullen, are you going to talk the entire time?”

He smiles against her shoulder, not wanting to laugh in the face of her exasperation, especially when he’s got so many serious things on his mind.

“If I have to,” he replies, continuing to leisurely stroke himself to full mast. “I might run out of things to say, first.”

She turns her head to look at him, the angle awkward but her annoyance clear. “Somehow, I doubt that.”

She’s on her side and he slips in close behind her, hand now moving from his cock to slide between her legs as he kisses her quiet. “I just want to understand.”

“Mmm, understand what?” she asks, the last word coming out as more of a whine, facing forward again as he parts the folds of her sex and smoothly presses a finger inside her, pumping slowly.

“You. Why you hated me. It was because I was weak, wasn’t it?”

“What? That’s not… no, that’s not how it works. Lots of people are weak.”

He’s not sure if he’ll be getting better or worse answers, distracting her like this, but he’s more than willing to find out, and he inserts another finger, letting his thumb dance teasingly over her clit as he does.

“And I’m willing to bet you hated them all.”

“Well, then you’re as bad at gambling as I’ve heard,” she shoots back with a gasp, desire robbing her voice of any edge she wants it to have. “You still don’t understand, it’s not a bad thing.”

He shakes his head even through she can’t see it, speeding up the motions of his hand slightly. She’s still not quite as wet as he’d like, though his words can’t be particularly stimulating. “No, I understand that much, at least. I spent a long time thinking about everything you said, and I get it, even if I’m still not certain I agree. You said weakness was something to be _envied.”_

“Cullen, will you shut up and fuck me already?” she snaps, and he knows he’s getting close to something.

He nuzzles against the back of her neck, heedless of her aggravation. “You’re not ready yet.”

She scoffs. “I think I can be the judge of that,” she says, pressing her arse back against him. “Cullen, _please.”_

Fuck, that feels good. Unable to stifle his groan at the warm pressure against his dick, he acquiesces, drawing his hand back to guide himself slowly into her from behind. She moans, long and loud and shuddering, and he has to bite his lip to keep his wits about him. He can’t lose focus, here.

“When was the last time you were weak, Neria?”

She stiffens slightly, and whether it’s at the question or the physical intrusion, he doesn’t know.

“Never. Oh, you feel so good. Needed this so much,” she gasps, pressing her face into the sheets while he pillows his head against his other arm, settling in. Her words, whether intended as distraction or not, go straight to his prick, and he fucks her slowly, his strokes careful, measured. Sustainable. He’s not going to be done with her for a while yet.

“That’s not right, that’s not what you — _ah, Maker, you’re tight_ — not what you said,” he manages, regaining his train of thought. “You said people go back and forth.” Surely he should get a few extra style points for carefully timing the last few words to his thrusts.

_“Most_ people,” she amends, clearly focusing on her breathing, since he really isn’t shutting up any time soon. “I’m not most people.”

“That you aren’t,” he chuckles fondly before growing serious again. “But surely it’s a luxury you’ve earned by now.”

“Wrong… _ahhhh…_ wrong again.”

“How would you know if you’ve never tried? Never simply gone along with things, never _not_ fought?”

She doesn’t reply beyond slow, panting breaths in time with the drive of his body into her own.

“Neria?”

“Fine. Once. I let myself give in once, and I have spent the last ten years trying to make up for it. And I do _not_ want to talk about it with _you_ , now or ever. All right?”

He’s not sure what it says about him that he can keep going without missing a beat in the face of that. Nothing good, probably.

“All right,” he replies, knowing he’s bumped up against the limits of what he can get from her. Just because they can tell each other anything, doesn’t mean they should always want to, and that’s… all right. “Why not?”

She doesn’t hesitate this time. “Because I always knew I couldn’t do it, that it wasn’t for me, and I proved myself right. Because if I thought being weak was okay, even for an instant, I would have died at eighteen, at the end of _your_ sword.”

Now _that_ makes him falter, his hips stuttering once before stilling, breath catching in his throat, but she doesn’t give him time to turn that fresh bit of resentment over in his head.

“Fuck, that’s not what I-- Look, I was weak once, I regret it, and it has nothing to do with you, just… Cullen, don’t _stop,”_ she moans the last in desperation, reaching back with one hand to grab at his thigh, urge him back on.

He takes a moment to reluctantly regain his rhythm as she runs deft fingers along his flank and he wraps his arm around her, holding her close against his chest. He almost wants to ask again if she’s sure she doesn’t hate him, but what he goes with instead is “Things are different now. You can be whoever or whatever you want to be.” He pauses for the span of a few strokes, warring with whether the next words are a good idea or not before taking the plunge. “With me.”

“Cullen, don’t,” she says, a tense warning that he brushes aside. He’s not afraid of her anymore. That’s good.

“Calm down, I’m not going to tell you that I love you again.” He chuckles quietly, and she makes an uneasy noise, low in the back of her throat. He lifts his head enough to lean forward and press a few placating kisses against her jaw. “It’s true, though. You can be weak now. No one’s in a position to hurt you for it, least of all me.”

She shakes her head, and he drags his teeth lightly down her jaw to her neck. “You’re wrong,” she says, hand now gripping his arse and urging him forward, to collide with her harder and harder. He keeps his pace, though.

“Maybe, but… so what if I am? I don’t matter, remember? So… even if you’re right, and it would be a mistake… there’d be no harm done, would there? Not like there might be with…” He hesitates, swallowing thickly. This isn’t something they talk about. “Anyone else.”

She doesn’t reply right away, and for once, he thinks it best not to press. He just does all she’s asked of him; he fucks her, slow and deep, sucking kisses into every inch of her he can comfortably reach, palming a breast, pinching and tugging her nipple until she mewls and writhes in his embrace.

“Why is this so important to you?”

“Because I think I understand and I want to be sure. Because…” He has to reach for the real reason, but he gets there quickly enough. “When I’m with E-- When I’m with the Inquisitor, I’ve always felt stronger. In her arms, I can do anything, and I’ve always thought that was a good thing. But the way you explained things got me thinking, that maybe it’s not good in and of itself, maybe it’s just _different._ Maybe you and I could be good, too. Maybe we can be… weak. Together.”

He doesn’t realize how nervous he is to hear her response to that until the silence stretches and his chest tightens with every panted breath.

“Okay.”

Wait, really?

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah, yes. Okay. Let’s do it, let’s be weak together.”

He can’t help his grin, as she moans quietly, now reaching up to rest her hand at the back of his neck.

He’s doing it. He’s getting somewhere.

 

 

_Twenty-four hours earlier, he knows that he lied._

_She sleeps peacefully next to him, silvery hair peeking out from where she’s curled up, buried in the bedding, and he knows that he will never be able to end things with her. No matter how many times he tries, no matter how often he tries to rehearse the necessary words, no matter how he knows that it’s the only right thing to do. The only noble option he has left to him, anyway._

_Promising to break up with her would be like promising to simply stop breathing. Grand words, but ultimately futile. His body would never let him do it._

_Then again, soon he’ll be doing the equivalent of strapping chains to his feet and leaping into an ocean. Not the same thing as holding one’s breath forever, no, but the same ultimate outcome. At least once the body is found._

_Actions speak louder than words, and he’s always been better at action._

 

 

“Cullen, I’m close.”

He already knows, of course, knows her shallower breathing and her clutch at the arm he’s got around her chest and her leg hooked back over his, spreading herself open to him in her push to climax.

It’s still nice to hear.

He picks up his speed a little for her sake, whispering encouragements in her ear, but doesn’t otherwise change his approach any. He lets the build come upon her naturally, in its own patient time, until she’s whimpering and frustrated and exhausted from being on the cusp for so long.

She shatters, and it’s perfect. He stills, and it’s temporary.

“Cullen? Do you want me to…” she manages, still breathless when he deems her sufficiently recovered and takes up his old rhythm again.

He pushes her hair out of the way and smiles against her temple, pressing a soft, chaste kiss there before replying. “No, this is fine.” His smile spreads. “I can keep this up all night.”

He’s still got things to talk about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hammered this one out over the Labour Day weekend (since long weekends are the only time I actually get two days off in a row), continued apologies for the crazy delays, and an acknowledgment that they will probably continue! At least things aren't quite so up-in-the-air after this chapter? Which was originally much longer, but I pared out a lot because it felt redundant. Maybe I'll flash back to the cut-out bits in a future chapter. Never fear, stability in this story is ever an illusion. Thanks for sticking with me for so long, I LOVE YOU ALL.


	14. A Little Bit Genghis Khan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An interlude with the king. Takes places directly after 'Chess'. Rating: E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two quick links to drop before we start! The first is [In Dreams](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7993120), a little side piece that started out as a chapter in THIS story, but which I eventually spun out into its own little thing because it was (GET THIS) too depressing. It's canon to this series, but not necessary, so feel to skip it if the warnings on it turn you off.
> 
> The second, and more exciting, is [Disgrace](http://archiveofourown.org/works/7825801) by LePetitChouNerd, a wonderful story inspired by this one that you should all go and read if you're into this sort of thing! It hits a lot of the same points as this series (Cullen cheats on Lavellan with Surana, pain ensues), but spins them out into some really unique and interesting places, by turns heartbreaking and surprisingly hopeful. GO READ IT RIGHT NOW, it's okay, Alistair will still be here when you get back.
> 
> Ready? Okay!

She wakes slowly. It’s a nice change of pace.

“Welcome home.”

Blinking rapidly as if the dim candlelight were noonday sun, Neria sits up rapidly in bed when she realizes she’s no longer alone. Alistair sits across from her, leaning forward over spread knees, having pulled his desk chair over to the side of the bed to be closer. He looks… thoughtful.

“I didn’t even hear you come in,” she says with a small yawn, stretching her shoulders as much as she can while keeping the blankets bunched up around her. “How long have you been sitting there?”

“Just long enough to start getting creepy,” he replies with a grin that she can’t help but mirror, even after the miserable last week she’s had. His curiously thoughtful demeanor evaporates as he stands up. “Wasn’t expecting you back so soon. When did you get in?”

“Mmm, what time is it? A few hours ago, maybe? Not long before sundown, anyway.”

He flashes her a pout over his shoulder as he undresses, shucking off his furred capelet and tossing it over the back of the chair. “And you left me alone all that time? Haven’t seen each other in months, and you’d rather take a nap first?”

She rolls her eyes fondly before shrugging and leaning back against the elaborately carved headboard. His jerkin is the next to go, creamy embossed leather unceremoniously hitting the floor before he sits at the foot of the bed in tunic and breeches to remove his boots as she explains. “I was tired. And I really wanted to see you, but seeing as I love court _almost_ as much you do, that just would have been a recipe for causing an incident. Besides, you were working, that’s hardly _alone_. When you’re already being pulled in five different directions, what am I going to do except add a sixth?”

“You let me know you’re actually here, so I can beg off early. Obviously.” Reaching out, he rests one large hand against the rise in the covers that turns out to be her calf, squeezing gently. “You’re the one direction I always want to be pulled.”

She sees his gaze dip subtly down from her face, but it doesn’t go any further than her collar before darting back up, surprisingly intense in spite of the cheesy line. She tries to deflect, make fun of him, but maybe his intensity is catching; she can’t quite pull it off.

“Well… we’re both here now.”

“Are you all right?”

She blinks a few times, unsure what to say. Of _course_ he can see right through her, even if he has no clue what’s on the other side.

She pulls up a smile, tries to let herself forget all the reasons why she was in such a hurry to get back to Denerim, to _him_ this time around.

“I am now.” No sense in lying to him, telling him that nothing is wrong when he wouldn’t believe it, anyway.

“Want to talk about it?” Alistair asks, pulling up the blankets at the foot of the bed just enough to slip his hand underneath and find her foot, warm fingers wrapping nearly all the the way around her ankle in some simple gesture of pointed, deliberate intimacy.

“No. Not yet. I… Is that okay?” She really doesn’t want to have to make something up on the fly (and one day she’ll tell him the truth, she _will_ , but she can’t even begin to think about that now).

“Absolutely not,” he replies, and she frowns slightly until she feels his fingers creep up her calf and the look on his face shifts from one of genuine concern to… something else. “Wait a minute. Are you…” He looks around the quiet room before whipping his head back in her direction and letting his voice drop into a hissing, exaggerated stage whisper. _”…naked_ under there?”

She huffs out a breathy laugh, nearly overwhelmed with love and relief at his willingness to drop the matter. She’ll come up with some way to placate him overnight; for now, she doesn’t want to have to think any more.

“You know,” she says, settling back against the pillows and falling easily back into flirty old habits now that he’s here, “I’m not rightly sure. Honestly, I was so tired when I got in, I hardly remember undressing, but who knows?”

“Oh, no,” Alistair clucks his tongue as he leans back, fingers climbing higher beneath the covers, dancing delicately up all of the bare skin he can reach while still sitting. “No, no, no, this won’t do at all. A naked mage sneaking into the king’s bedchamber? What would the servants say if they came across you like this?”

“Nothing that hasn’t been said before, I’d wager,” Neria chuckles lightly as he skims his fingertips up across her inner thigh and his eyes grow dark in the candlelight. “Besides,” she adds with a shrug that skirts as close to coquettish as she’s willing to get, “I’m still not certain _what_ state I’m in under here.”

“Mmm, you’re right,” he says, suddenly decisive. His brows draw down and he nods once, crisply. “I’d better have a closer look.” And he tosses the blankets up over his head and gets to work with a smirk that she misses entirely.

 

***

 

He eats her out like a starving man. Like one made to walk a desert only to find an oasis lying between a woman’s legs. Or a criminal condemned to swing, told that his only possible salvation lies in pleasing his comely elven hangman.

Hangwoman? Surely not every profession needs to be gendered, and hangperson just sounds awkward.

“Oh, fuck, Alistair, you’re killing me,” Neria cuts off his mental tangent with a moan, clutching his hair and pressing his face further into her sex. Not that he can really _get_ any closer. He’s always favoured enthusiasm over strict technique in these endeavours, and with both thumbs gently parting her folds, he’s already plunging his tongue as deeply inside of her as he can physically go without unhinging his jaw like one of those giant Tevinter serpents.

He keeps it up until she starts to babble, a nonsense string of non sequiturs that begins with an enumeration of all the ways he’s killing her that may or may not be metaphors (the bit about the poleaxe must be, surely?) and ends with her clamping her thighs tightly against his ears so he can’t actually hear any more of it. The way she talks during oral sex, an incessant and uncontrollable stream of consciousness that makes her sound like an absolute lunatic, has long been one of Alistair’s favourite things in the world no matter how much she says it embarrasses her, and he’d grin if only his jaw wasn’t so sore from mouthing her so vigorously.

It reminds him of the tangents his own mind keeps heading off on. He likes tangents. They keep his from… dwelling on certain things.

When he slides one hand up to rub her clit, he’s not gentle about it. He practically slaps her, three fingers moving in a blur there in the darkness beneath blankets he’s been alone underneath for so long, taking advantage of how wound up he’s gotten her while tipping his head to catch his breath enough to prepare for a final assault.

He waits for her words to rise in pitch and timbre, growing indistinct around the edges until she’s just crying out again and again, then he replaces fingers with tongue and tongue with fingers, wrapping his lips around her swollen nub and sucking while pressing up into her with two digits just in time to feel her clench around him.

He works her over even harder when he feels her start to come, mouth pressed firmly against her while he shakes his head from side to side like a damn dog. She manages to cry out only once at the motion before her voice breaks entirely, the rest coming out more as a wheeze than a whimper while she shakes, arching up into herself, her heels digging painfully into his back. Even then, he refuses to let up, not for long moments, until she’s gasping and physically trying to push him away from her.

He feels a mess, absolutely coated in the evidence of her passion from his nose to his chin, and for a moment, he relaxes, revels in the debauched perfection of her taste and her smell and the blissfully blinding darkness he’s enveloped himself within.

Only a moment, though.

 

***

 

She’s gone. She’s lost, unable to see or breathe or do anything but _feel_ and it’s utterly perfect. She collapses back against the pillows, lost in her own little world, unaware of anything but relief, the release of tension and ache washing out from her cunt to every other part of her body.

For now, she doesn’t understand how she’s ever able to leave this bed.

Awareness comes back to her with the light thumping of clothes hitting the floor as Alistair squirms around beneath the covers near the foot of the bed. She tries to say his name, to call or to question, but that’s still a bit beyond her, so she just tries to lift the blankets up to see him instead. He’s ready by then, though, undressed and already moving up the bed to cover her quivering form with his own, swift and predatory.

She tilts her head up to (finally) kiss him, but he only grins and ducks his head at the last second to press his mouth to the side of her neck. He keeps surprising her in little ways, but she surprised him in turning up like this at all, so that’s probably fair.

Sighing, she relaxes beneath the comforting weight of him, that sorely missed feeling of being possessed that once she rallied so strongly against. He gives her scant seconds to enjoy it, roughly palming a breast while sucking at her neck before he settles between her legs and slides himself inside, causing her breath to hitch in her throat once more.

 

***

 

She told him once, a long time ago, how perfectly she found they fit together. ‘Like your cock was built for me,’ were the exact words, hushed and awed, and it’s something that comes back to him now and again when they join. He, admittedly, doesn’t have much in the way to compare to, so he’s been content enough to take her word for it. He thinks he can see it right now, though. Something about the way his dick curves up, running the tip of it over all those unseen spots that make her writhe, something about the way she grips him, so tight all the way through that the moment of penetration always makes him feel like he’s about to black out. The way she instantly falls in line with even the most punishing pace he can set (and the one he sets now is just that), two bodies moving as one, no amount of time between them getting in the way of how they just _fit_. That can't all be something that any two random people could happen to share. It can't.

And, of course, there’s _that._ That one little thing. Planting one last nip against the juncture of her neck and shoulder and relishing her yelp, Alistair takes a minute to slow his thrusts, carefully feeling her out and lifting one of her thighs higher, angling his hips alongside hers until he hits the entrance of her womb, knocking abruptly against that barrier like reaching too quickly into the back of a closet, and she cries out suddenly, arms flying around his shoulders.

It’s not something he enjoys, per se. The first time it happened, in fact, he was pretty sure he’d found a way to kill her from being so bad at sex. It hurts her, is the thing, and that’s not something he’s ever been capable of getting off on, no matter her reassurances.

“Oooooh, Maker, yes,” she finally gasps once the initial shock of it has worn off, and that’s the kicker. She’s always seemed to like it, for whatever reason, and while it’s far from his favourite thing to do, as an occasional treat? Sure, why not?

Her eyes fly open when he does it again, however, her cry choking off and dying in her throat to become a questioning moan. One to which he has no answer but the drive of his hips, slamming so deep into her body that there’s literally nowhere else for him to go.

This is new. He’s never pushed it so hard for longer than a stroke or two. He’s never _wanted_ to, as it’s a bit uncomfortable and the way she desperately urges him on with her body is totally at odds with her pained cries in a manner that isn’t normally appealing.

Tonight, though? Tonight, he’s got something else in him, something under his skin, something ugly and selfish that drives him on, fucking her until she screams loudly enough to wake half the castle while he growls and bites kisses into the creamy skin of her neck.

Maybe there’s something to be said for leaving his comfort zone; he comes so hard it makes him dizzy, spilling deep inside her body with a broken little cry of his own. Coming and coming and coming until he feels drained of everything, life and all.

He rolls off of her with a long groan, falling heavily into bed beside her, but he’s not actually sure whether or not she reached her end a second time; it was all kind of a blur there for a while. When he turns to her, there are tears sparkling in her eyes, but a dazed, dopey sort of smile on her lips.

“What was that…” she tries, having just as a difficult time as he to catch her breath, it seems. “What was _that_ for?”

He still doesn’t have an answer. “Missed you?”

She stares at him for a long moment before breaking out in a grin and rolling into him for a disheveled, sweaty kiss.

 

***

 

_Finally,_ Neria thinks, as his tongue slides against hers. _Now_ she feels like she’s home.

“Are you hungry?” he asks when he draws back, resting his hand against that one spot on her neck he’s been so hung up on all night, to the point where it’s feeling a little raw. “You said you got in a while ago and went straight to bed, when was the last time you ate?”

“I could eat,” she replies slowly. In truth, she’s a bit ravenous after all the travel and all the confusion and all the _everything else_ , but she’s also a little nauseous and she doesn’t want to budge from his side just yet, wincing a little in trying to settle herself against his chest.

“What’s wrong? I didn’t hurt you, did I?” he asks, frowning with the sudden concern she expected to surface back when he was actually _doing_ it.

She shakes her head quickly, not wanting the delicious ache in her abdomen to dissuade him from ever doing that again. “No, baby,” she whispers, kissing him soundly once more. “Not like that. Hurt so good. I just need a minute.”

He seems uncertain, but he returns her kiss anyway, gently laying her back down while carefully caressing her stomach before sitting up.

“Stay here, I’ll run down to the kitchens, grab us something to eat and you can tell me what you’ve all been up to since the last time.”

“What? No, I’ll come with you,” she protests, not wanting to separate for anything and flinching while she forces herself to move as well.

“Forget it,” he says with a firmness that would have once been uncharacteristic of him before his smile shows through. “Look at you, you can barely sit up. If any of the servants catch us, they’ll think I kicked you in the stomach or something.”

“Ow, don’t make me laugh,” she chuckles at the thought, though she relents a bit and lays back. “That’d be such a great rumour to start, though. Maybe you knocked me up and couldn’t bear the thought of bringing another bastard into the world.”

He laughs. “Or _maybe_ you just lie here and get some more rest and I’ll be back with the good cheese, yeah?” Slowly, he disengages and starts hunting about on the floor for his breeches. “And then we can try to come up with something even more exciting for round two.”

 

***

 

She’s fallen back asleep by the time Alistair returns, platter in hand piled high with breads and fruits and (of course) cheeses. The kitchen staff had tried to insist on making something and bringing it all up to his chambers for him, but he wants to keep things simple tonight.

As simple as they ever are, anyway.

He sets the tray down and hesitates, just watching her sleep for another long moment.

His actions have resulted in a large patch of mottled skin right by her throat; his sucking, biting kisses quickly blooming into bruises that send a stab of guilt through him. He hadn’t done it on purpose, but the message is clear: _I was here._ It’s possessive, obscene, but it does its job.

It hides the marks that were already there when he came across her in his bed. The faded (but not quite enough) blemishes that could only be the love-bite of another.

She’d always been so careful before. He’s not sure what’s changed, and it worries him.

She’d always been so careful.

 

***

 

It’s somehow even darker when she wakes up this time, a strange pressure on her ear that she reaches up to investigate when she feels her hand lightly slapped away.

“Hold still! I wanted to see how much I could stack on your head before you woke up. If you move, it's going to be an absolute disaster.”

“Alistair! What the fuck!” It’s difficult not to laugh now that she recognizes the pressure as a pillow balanced on the side of her face with Maker-knows-what piled on top.

“I mean it, I’m taking it off, but if you so much as flinch, it’s going to be awful. And then I’ll be the one mad at _you_ for crumbs in the bed for once.”

Pressing her lips tightly together, she sighs through her nose, closes her eyes, and waits. This ridiculous fucking man that she somehow gave a country to.

“I love you.”

That’s probably a bit too serious a sentiment for the moment, but she can’t help it.

“Tell me that again when we have to sleep in the guest quarters because I made a mess and _then_ I’ll believe you.”

She smiles.


	15. Pathological Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen has a low-key proposition. Directly follows "He Said/She Said (No Alarms and No Surprises)". Rating: T.

He holds her, after. These moments never seem to last, and Cullen relishes them. A few minutes where they can just _be,_ safe from whatever drama must invariably follow or the strict time limits on their trysts. Tempers on hold, passions cooled, just slow breathing and a gentle play of fingertips on skin as they wait for what comes next, together.

What comes next? Cullen never seems to know with Surana.

“Talk to me,” he murmurs quietly, nose buried in her hair, and he can feel her smile against his chest.

“And here I thought you were finally all talked out. Certainly seemed to have run out of words near the end, there.”

He flushes, face and neck warming at the reminder of their exertions, specifically how he’d finally lost it in the end. _Hours_ of gentle rutting, of coaxing out the truths he craves from her, finally coming to a head when he’d pressed her face down onto the bed and just fucked out all that pent-up tension. He can’t even remember what triggered it, now, a solid few minutes lost to his frenzy and the ensuing post-coital fog.

“I certainly did,” he admits, grinning in spite of his blush. If she calls him out on it, he can blame it on all the blood finally returning to the places it’s supposed to be. “Felt good.”

“Mmm, it better have. I’m going to be sore riding out tomorrow.”

“That’s not what I-” he begins, not bothering to finish the thought with anything other than a huff and a slow smile. She knows what he meant. Not feeling like he has a million different things to try to tell her for once is a release that goes far beyond sex.

Maker, but she’s soft. She doesn’t seem like she should be so soft.

“The next time you’re here,” because he’s finally given up on pretending there won’t be as many ‘next times’ as he can get out of this, “we should do something different.”

“Different?” She shifts slightly to look up at him with wide grey eyes, somehow brighter in the flickering candlelight than usual. A smile still tugs at the corners of her mouth. “Like what, fucking on the couch?”

“Not _quite_ what I had in mind,” Cullen chuckles, though it certainly isn’t a bad idea, his cock even giving a half-hearted twitch at the thought of bending her over one arm of the guest quarter’s plush settee. “I was thinking more along the lines of meeting in my office.”

“Your office?” Neria repeats, making a face. “Because _that_ sounds comfy. Do you even have a bed? I sort of assumed you just slept standing up, like a horse.”

“Of course I have a—” Cullen splutters indignantly before course correcting, tipping his head back against the pillow with a sigh. “Not that we’d be using it, anyway, I don’t mean meeting for… _this.”_

She frowns ever so slightly at that, and Cullen wants to reach up and smooth out the delicate crease between her eyes with his thumb. Instead, he slides a hand slowly down her side and along the curve of her arse, as if he needs to spell out what _this_ entails. “What for, then? Surely you don’t have to proposition me for updates on troop movements or whatever it is you do all day.”

He shrugs. “Just to spend time together, alone? Without distractions, or expectations, I don’t know.” He shrugs again as he stares at the ceiling, a helpless little motion, feeling a bit stupid for saying anything at all. “It was just an idea.”

“An odd one,” she replies, but her fingers alight gently against his chin and she tilts his face back toward her. “I would have thought that the last time proved we’re far better off just skipping over talking to get to the good bits.”

“Or talking over them,” he points out, since this night certainly doesn’t feel like a failure to him.

“Or that,” she allows, ducking her head to hide her slight smile and masking the motion by pressing a quick kiss to the underside of his jaw before meeting his gaze again. “Even so. Why press our luck?”

“Neria, please,” Cullen scoffs lightly. “Pressing our luck is about all we do, when you get right down to it. I don’t see what’s so worrying about being together like this without lying together first. I take my meals in there at odd hours all the time, so there’d be no cause for suspicion, I could grab a bottle of wine from the cellar, we could make a night of it. We can even retire back here, afterward, if the sex is a must. Which… makes me sound far less enthusiastic about that part of it than I quite obviously can be, but my point stands.”

“And what point would that be?” Neria asks, sounding genuinely confused even as she begins to pull away from him. He tries to tug her back into his arms, but she disengages anyway, sits up despite his best efforts. “You don’t need to woo me, Cullen, we’re far beyond that. And I’m in no position to offer you the same, if that’s what you’re looking for.”

“That’s not… I’m not trying to _woo_ you, I just want more chances to get to know you a bit better, is that so wrong?” Sighing, he pushes himself up to sit as well, slipping his arms around her and pulling her against him, the smooth expanse of her back to his chest. She tenses, but it’s out of stubbornness more than any real discomfort and he feels her relax into the embrace after a moment. “For what it’s worth? No matter how badly things ended… I quite enjoyed just playing chess with you in the garden.”

She doesn’t reply right away, just lays her hands against his arms where they remain wrapped around her waist while their breaths fall into steady sync again. “Cullen, you’re having no-strings-attached sex while the supposed love of your life remains none the wiser. It’s pretty fucking selfish to want more than that, wouldn’t you say?”

“I would,” Cullen agrees without hesitation, and he can feel her surprise in the stiffening of her spine. He’s not that easy to push away. “We’re both pretty fucking selfish people, that much is rather obvious.” He drops his voice to a whisper, brushing his lips against her ear before he continues, and the hitch in her breathing speaks volumes. “I’m not asking you out on a date, here, but I have to believe that I’m doing this for a reason, and a few hours of your company where making you come isn’t one of my main priorities might be enough to give me one. Not asking for it to be a regular thing, either, we’ve got a rather decent routine going, as far as I’m concerned. We’ll lock the doors, hide away from the world, still know that we’re doing something wrong, it’d just be… different, that’s all. Something other than these same four walls, something fresh. Just give in, Neria, you know it sounds nice.” He drops his voice further, his next words emerging as nothing but the merest breath. “Be weak with me.”

She groans slightly under her breath, and Cullen knows that he’s got her.

“It had better be some damn good wine,” she intones, and he grins, pressing his face to her neck and pulling her back down to the sheets to cover her body with his own.

“Two bottles it is.”

He holds her, after, until the hour forces him to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have three chapters partially written, and this was NONE OF THEM, jeez. Something that could almost pass for fluffy if you pretend it's in a different story just demanded to be written on a whim, idk. HOPEFULLY MORE UPDATES SOON.


	16. Crisis Points

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two very different relationships reach their lowest points. Rating: T

**THE PAST**

“What’s wrong? You’ve been all… sulky lately, and there are only so many more times I can deflect with humour and let it slide.”

“Somehow I doubt that.”

“All right, fine, but the jokes are going to start getting _really_ bad if this goes on for much longer. Fair warning.”

She tries to smile, but seems to give up halfway in favour of gnawing on her bottom lip. He’s never seen her like this; even when things have been at their absolute worst, she’s always been able to at _least_ find cause to smile, however darkly. Always.

“In your time, then. On to more important matters: what are we doing for lunch?”

 

**THE FUTURE**

His footsteps crunch in the thinning snow until he reaches the grassy overhang she sits upon, right where Varric said he’d find her. Beneath her feet, there’s a small drop before a hill begins and rolls gently down to the valley far below.

“Ellana?”

Loud, too loud. He should have left it at footsteps.

“Yes, Commander?”

“I don’t…” He sighs. _I don’t know what to say._

“So don’t.”

He doesn’t. He just stands there for long moments, an awkward, uncomfortable presence as she idly kicks her legs, dangling them over the side of the ridge.

 

**THE PAST**

Three days pass.

“It’s about Connor.”

“Pardon?”

“You wanted to know why I’ve been so distracted lately, it’s Connor.”

“Is that all?”

“Ex _cuse_ me?”

“That… came out wrong. You know I’ve been heartbroken about the whole thing since Eamon wrote, but… I don’t know, I suppose I thought you were a bit above it all? You hardly said a word about it.”

She bows her head and he tries to recover.

“I suppose that was rather insensitive of me to assume, wasn’t it? I got so lost in my own grief, I never bothered to think about how it might affect you. Sure, you didn’t really know them, but you still saved Connor’s life, that must count for something. Er… not that you’d _need_ a personal connection to be affected by a young boy disappearing, that’s not what I-”

She takes a sharp breath and cuts him off, voice breaking.

“Alistair, I need to tell you something.”

When he reaches out to her, she roughly shrugs his hand away.

 

**THE FUTURE**

Eventually, she speaks. Even now, after everything, she’s trying to make things easier for him when she could just as easily leave him to squirm indefinitely, twisting in the wind of her silent judgments.

“Why?”

“Wh- why what?” Cullen stammers carefully, because there are a few different ways to answer that and he’s wary of picking the wrong one.

“Do you love her?”

Ah. That why.

“I don’t… maybe? It’s not like that, though, it’s complica-”

“Fuck, Cullen!” Ellana suddenly cries, her calm front shattering as she slams a fist, small yet powerful, into the ground at her side, sending a shower of pebbles tumbling off the edge and on down the hillside. “You couldn’t just say yes?”

“I… I…” he attempts, shocking into stupidity by her outburst, even if it didn’t seem half as loud or jarring as the clumsy footfalls that heralded his arrival. Those were an intrusion, her anger belongs here. “Would it be better if I did?”

She seems to shrink a little at that, bowing her head. Her voice is quiet when she speaks again, but still sharp.

“I don’t know. I suppose it changes nothing, but at least then I could _understand_. It would still hurt, but I could accept it. If you _don’t_ love her, though…”

“Then why?” Cullen finishes for her, tired and flat. All this time, and he still doesn’t have a good answer to a rather fundamental question.

“I suppose it would simply have to be me, in that case.”

“What? No!” he cries with a start.

“Well, if you don’t love her, and it meant nothing, then obviously, I _must_ be lacking in some way, mustn’t I?”

_”No,”_ Cullen replies, more forcefully now. “This has nothing to do with you, Ellana, you are perfect, _I’m_ the one who lacks,” the words come in a rush, but as he approaches, footsteps giving him away once again, she throws her hand out to stop him. The mark crackles angrily, tendrils of green energy snaking from her palm, as if even the Fade itself is warning him away.

“Stop. Just… stop. I can’t hear this from you right now.”

 

**THE PAST**

“Get out.”

“What?”

“You heard me. I want you gone.”

There’s a tremor to his movements. He’s _shaking,_ shaken, and in trying to keep himself restrained, his rage makes it almost looks like he’s vibrating, somehow. It’s not the first time she’s seen him like this, but it’s the first time that it’s been because of her. Usually, it means someone or something is about to die.

“Alistair…”

“What?!” He wheels on her, every inch the king. “How can you possibly have been expecting me to react? If you thought it could go remotely well, you would have bloody well told me the truth when you _fucking did it!”_

Neria blinks, winces. More surprised by the cursing than his ire, but even though she knew this would be bad, she still wasn’t prepared.

Opens her mouth, but there’s nothing left to say.

“I just…” The moment passed, emotion overwhelms him now as he shakes his head, runs his hands through his hair. “How could you _do_ this? You’re a mage, you’re Harrowed, you _know_ better than…”

“It just seemed cleaner.” She tries to tack on a stammered amendment of ‘at the time,’ but she’s too slow.

“Cleaner?” Sheer incredulity. “How is this _possibly_ cleaner? What is _wrong_ with you? If you wanted clean, you should have just killed him yourself, you monster!”

“Probably,” she agrees under her breath, angering him further. She’s feeling oddly distant, now. Above it all, as Alistair described it earlier. Something horrible is happening, and she’s just watching it play out. “Struck me as a fair deal, is all.” One foot in, and still digging.

“Murdering a woman and handing her son over to a demon in the name of blood magic seemed like a fair deal, did it? Maker, I don’t even _know_ you.”

“Where did you think I learned it, then? You had to have known, on some level.”

“Don’t you _dare_ turn this back on me. I just assumed it was something you picked up from Avernus’ research that took a while to parse, or… or… _something_ , I never would have dreamed _this._ ” He throws up his arms, flailing about for some explanation that could have satisfied him so long when the truth was simply that he knew better than to think about it too much. He spits the last word, and she’s still wound up enough to flinch.

“Yes, well. Dreams were never our strong suit, were they?”

He practically growls at that.

“I told you to leave. I meant it. _Now.”_

“But-”

She’s not sure why she bothers. There’s nothing left to say.

“I don’t want to hear it! Maker, I can’t even _look_ at you right now, I just… need you gone.” His voice _almost_ quails at that, but he stops to take a breath and is all steel again when he continues, even if he turns away from her when he does, just in case. “Take some coin on your way out, get yourself a room in the city. I don’t care, but you’re not staying here tonight.”

It takes her long moments to be capable of movement again. She tries to mouth his name, and he stalks off to stare out of their bedroom window. 

His bedroom window?

As soon as she can manage it, Neria breaks into a run.

 

**THE FUTURE**

“I… of course. Whatever you wish,” Cullen sighs, defeated. He’s the only one present who knew to prepare for this inevitability (not that he could _ever_ be prepared for this), it’s mad to expect her to be ready and willing to process the whole of it at once when even he isn’t. “I’ll go.”

“Before you do…” she says, finally turning to face him. He’s not sure why her puffy, red-rimmed eyes catch him off guard, but they do. He’s never actually seen her cry before, so even with ample reason to do so, it simply never occurred to him that she might.

He’s seen Neria cry, and considering how guarded she is with her emotions compared to open book Ellana, that strikes him as odd.

But it’s not the time for that.

“How long?”

Cullen doesn’t notice the tiny bloom of hope he harbours when she turns to him until it withers and dies at her question.

“How long?” he echoes, dumbly. Ellana remains calm, far too patient for a woman scorned.

“Yes. When did it start? I’m guessing this wasn’t the first time you two…”

She doesn’t bother finishing the thought, only watches him expectantly with her jaw set until he finds his voice again.

“Since she joined the Inquisition. Her first visit.” Even to his own ears, his voice sounds hollow, impersonal. He owes her honest answers, but there’s simply no good way to say some things.

He wasn’t prepared.

“So long?” she asks, voice rising sharply while quieting even further, making it painfully clear that, for all the time she’s spent out here on her own, wondering and dwelling and composing all sorts of elaborately awful scenarios, she still didn’t think it would be _so_ bad. That he could be _so_ untrue. “This entire time?”

And the look on her face.

Cullen would walk off a cliff without a second thought if it meant never causing her to make that face again, never set that lip to trembling, never cast that pall of sheer bewildered pain over those eyes. Never wipe it all away as she attempts to rein in her emotions.

It’s the look of betrayal.

 

**THE PAST**

Three days pass.

Three days before the knock comes at her door, light but insistent.

“Fuck off!” she finally shouts when it refuses to let up, barely lifting her head from the grimy tavern pillow. She’s only left her rented room (large and out of the way, but neglected by whatever passes for housekeeping in Denerim’s seedier back alley bars) long enough to keep herself drunk, and she’s not about to break a good streak like that because the bitch of a bar owner can’t wait for her to pay for another night.

What time _is_ it, anyway?

The knocking only eases for whoever it is to jiggle at the handle of the door, soundly locked to an outside world Surana couldn’t care less about.

“I _said-”_

“Please let me in, Neria. People are starting to give me that _look.”_

She’s on her feet and scrabbling with the latch so quickly that her legs nearly give out underneath her, weak as she is from sheer inactivity. When the door swings open, Alistair has to step in quickly just to keep her from swooning, suddenly dizzy.

“Whoa!” he exclaims, eyes wide, looking pained but trying to be glib, anyway. “When the crowd out front said you were in a state, I just thought they meant you’d been picking fights, not…” He shrugs, and she moves with the motions of his arms, limp and lost. Surely she must be dreaming.

“What?” she manages, trying to make sense of things while her head swims. “Why are you here?”

“Because I asked around? Sorry it took so long,” he replies, just as helpless in his way. “Considering the situation, you could have made yourself a _bit_ easier to find, you know.”

“No, I-” she begins, but he shushes her with a shake of his head, kicking the door closed behind him and bending low for a kiss.

“Can we talk after?” he asks, a rumble against her mouth from deep within his chest. She doesn’t bother to ask after what, just clings to him as best she can while he walks her back to the dingy bed she’s been calling her own. Hardly fit for a king, but for a murderer? It gets the job done.

“Missed you so much,” she whispers with a hitching breath, and while a part of her wants to say more, babble on about how she thought she’d never see him again, how she doesn’t deserve this, how he was right about everything, she stays her tongue. They’ll talk after. He’s back, and that’s all that matters.

It strikes her then, as he cradles her in strong arms and plunders her mouth, that she would let this man do absolutely anything he wanted in this moment. Hurt her, humiliate her. Beat her, rape her, kill her. Tear her to pieces and sneer at the mess, if only it meant he was _back_ , she would accept it all with total placidity. Alistair, for his part, would never abuse such a privilege, but it’s a rather unsettling realization nevertheless, and she swallows it down.

She hasn’t bathed, and she must taste like some unholy mixture of rye, vomit, and the salt from tear tracks she long ago stopped bothering to wipe away, but one would never guess it from the way he goes at her, undresses her slowly like she’s some blushing noble virgin while she throws off his travel cloak and does the same in rather more frantic motions.

They make love like it’s been three years as opposed to three days, and his sigh of supreme satisfaction when he finishes nearly breaks her heart all over again.

 

**THE FUTURE**

Cullen and Ellana stay, frozen in this one horrible moment, for what feels like an eternity.

He almost wishes it was one.

Because as soon as it’s over, it’s really going to be _over_ , as opposed to still _ending_ , and Cullen honestly doesn’t know how he’s going to survive that.

 

**THE PAST**

“So why?” Her voice is raw and earnest, and even he can’t deflect or feign obliviousness.

“Because I love you. And I’ve known who you are and what you’re capable of for as long as that’s been true.”

“But Connor…”

“Doesn’t change things.” His voice hardens, but he only holds her tighter when he goes on. “Maybe if you hadn’t hid the truth about what happened all this time, it would have, but it’s far too late for that now. I’m still furious with you, and we are _not_ done fighting about this, but…” He sighs. “I don’t want to waste a second more of our time together.”

“You really think you can forgive me, then?”

He shakes his head, decisive. “I don’t need to. It’s not my crime to forgive, all you did was lie to me. I’ve no intention of telling Eamon, though, for what it’s worth.”

It’s worth a lot. It’s worth everything.

“One question, though.”

“Anything.”

“Do you regret it?”

She stills, searching for the right answer, one that isn’t a lie, or a cover, or a justification. She doesn't _think_ everything rests on what she says here, but she'd rather not risk it, either, not when she's only just recovered something she was sure she'd lost forever.

“I didn’t. For a long time, I told myself that it was worth it, that we needed the power it brought me, that it was all for the greater good. That at least the Circle wouldn’t get their claws into him this way and some good could actually come of the whole mess. But now that he’s actually gone, I don’t…” She trails off, unable to continue, and readies herself for his rage to return, but he just brushes a few limp locks of hair back from her face and gives a grim noise of assent.

“You wouldn’t have told me if you still believed any of that.”

Neria buries her face against his chest and sobs herself to sleep.

 

**THE FUTURE**

She turns away before she can spill more painful truth than she’s willing, her tones suddenly clipped and professional, a mark of their new relationship as she stares off at the mountains, far in the distance.

“I’ll be riding out with the others in an hour. Try to enjoy the rest of your leave, Commander. We can speak properly when you return to Skyhold after some… needed distance.”

She hops from the ledge and disappears into a copse of scrubby trees set along the hillside before he can muster up a single word of reply, taking Cullen’s heart along with her.

 

**THE PAST**

They bathe together when she wakes. She keeps the water hot for hours and can almost bring herself to smile again when he points out how pruny they’ve gotten. Much later on, remembering his next words is what finally ends up doing the trick.

“Loving you, Neria… it’s like a plant. No, not a plant, plants die, scratch that, something else that grows. Hair, maybe? Every day, it’s a little bit longer, can’t be helped along or stopped. And if something is done to cut it… If I love you less, knowing this, than I did last week… I know that won’t be true for long. It just can’t be helped.”

“It’s not fair, is it?”

“Nothing’s fair. You taught me that. I’ll take what we can get out of it all the same.” He takes her hand. “Let’s go home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SPOILER ALERT: yeah they're gonna get caught
> 
> So guess what? Today is the ONE YEAR ANNIVERSARY of my uploading [Go Find Some Trouble](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5373362), the story that started this whole mess. Really did not think I'd still be writing about these two a whole year later, but I guess that's what I get for being so slow. Massive thanks to everyone who's read, commented, and kudos'd along the way, whether you're still following or not! <3333333


	17. Interview with the Templar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen confesses.

It takes Cullen one hundred and ninety-five steps to get from the central door of his office to that of the War Room. He knows this because he’s made the trek at least hundreds, likely thousands of times since arriving at Skyhold all those months ago.

From the War Room to the outdoors, the quickest route takes him one hundred and sixty-four steps. It’s one he’s walked far less, but more than enough to be overly familiar with, and the sunshine is warm on his skin when he re-emerges.

From the keep’s front steps, it takes him two hundred and thirty-three strides to get to the top of the southern battlements. This, admittedly, is more of an estimate, being outside of his regular pathways, but Cullen’s always been good with distances, and he knows Skyhold’s dimensions about as well as he knows his own name, so he feels fairly confident about it.

He walks an average of one hundred and thirty-one steps from one end of the battlements to the first tower in the row. He knows this because he paces its length a full eighteen times before giving in and letting his feet take him elsewhere.

Back down to the courtyard. Back towards the keep, but this time, he makes a turn. Three hundred and seven more steps all together.

There are one hundred and sixty-two stairs leading down to the dungeon. He knows this because he counts every last one on his way down. Taking them two at a time nets him a total of eighty-one steps from the top to the moment he reaches his ultimate destination and relieves the young soldier on guard duty, to much confusion.

Grabbing a stool and dragging it over to sit in front of a cell, he tallies things up in his head.

Three thousand, three hundred, and thirty steps to get there, give or take a few dozen. Margins of error, and all.

He wonders how many Samson took in getting to the very same place.

 

***

 

“Well, well, well. Has the good Herald finally decided what she’s doing with me, then? Or did you just choose to do me in all on your lonesome? Honestly, I’m surprised you didn’t come sooner.”

“Shut up.”

“Day’s been saved for those who can still see it, I’ve nothing more to offer you people. So unless this is a social call or you’ve decided to give me over to that dwarf of yours after all, that just leaves-”

“I’m cheating on the Inquisitor.”

Samson shuts up.

Cullen has never stated it quite so bluntly before, either out loud or in his own head, and it feels oddly freeing a thing to put out into the world. He’s cheating on Ellana. Four words. How could any four words spell out something as muddled and messy as this whole situation has become in his own mind?

He said it. It’s out there now. That means something.

“Ah, so it’s your own guts you’re wanting to spill then, not mine,” Samson replies after getting over his initial shock with a grin. “What a relief.”

Cullen’s eyes narrow. “Both is always an option.”

Samson’s smile doesn’t falter. He’s had a lot of time on his own down here to practice looking smug. “Fair enough. Why tell me?”

Cullen hesitates only briefly. He hasn’t exactly thought this out any, but he’s here to speak, isn’t he? May as well pour it on.

“Because I needed to tell _someone_ or I was going to end up telling _her_. Because I have a million and one things I wish I could talk about, but Leliana is the only outside person who knows and she is _not_ an option. Because you and I were, if not _friends_ , then as close to it I had for years, pathetic as that is. Because no matter what you might say to anyone else, they’ll never believe you, particularly where I’m concerned. Because maybe I _am_ planning to kill you and I figured I could use a confession beforehand.” Cullen squares his jaw, clenching his teeth in anger (not at Samson for once, just in general). “Take. Your. Pick.”

Samson is unbowed.

“Well. Preferably not that last one, if it’s all the same to you.”

“It absolutely is.”

“You know what I think?” Samson begins again. He’s close enough that he could probably attack should he possess any kind of makeshift weapon, even make a grab for Cullen’s own, but Cullen stands his ground as the Inquisition’s lone remaining captive leans casually against his cage. Honestly, at this point, Cullen would likely welcome an attempt. “I think that I’m the only person in this sorry world that you see enough of yourself in to look down on.”

“Think what you like. I don’t care.”

“That’s what makes me safe. Not these bars, not the fact that I’m a traitor whose word is worth less than nothing. It’s that we’re so alike, you can think as little of me as you do yourse-”

“I said I don’t care!” Cullen suddenly shouts, standing and slamming his fist painfully against the wall to the side of Samson’s cell before his angry echo through the empty dungeon reins him in. It won’t do to attract any more attention than he already has.

Samson never flinches, but his smile fades, returning him to the proper look of a man who’s been locked up for months following a crushing defeat. He sighs, tapping long fingers along metal bars as Cullen retreats to a safe distance, though he doesn’t sit back down. It’s all he can do not to go back to pacing.

“Fuck you and all your smug hypocrisy, Rutherford. I’m too tired for this. Do whatever it is you’re here to do.”

But what _is_ that, exactly?

“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore,” he finally admits, shoulders slumping as his ire slides from a boil down to a low simmer.

“You’ve got that much right, at least,” says Samson, giving a short, derisive snort. "And for the record, you've got it all wrong. We’re nothing alike, you and I. I’d never let a woman like that go, for starters.”

“She hasn’t gone anywhere,” Cullen protests, but it’s a feeble thing and Samson sees right through it.

“Oh, please. If you’re so pathetic that you’re coming to me with this, then it’s only a matter of time before you collapse under the weight of it all. Or she’ll find out first and it won’t matter. Either way, she’s already gone, already kicked your arse out to the streets, whether she knows it yet or not.”

“I try not to think about it. Perhaps she’ll forgive me?”

“Ha!” Samson barks, and Cullen has to wince at his own foolishness for even letting such a thing cross his mind, let alone his lips. “For something you’re not even sorry enough to stop doing? You’ll be lucky if she doesn’t throw you down here with me when she finds out!”

“I’d certainly deserve it,” Cullen can only mutter in agreement.

“I’ve dealt with that woman’s mercy, remember? Being saddled with _you_ for a keeper is already as good as it gets.”

“All right, that’s enough,” Cullen snaps. “You haven’t the right to speak of her.”

“So who _do_ I have the ‘right’ to speak of, hmm? This mystery lover of yours, perhaps? Do they have a name?”

“None that you’ll ever be privy to.”

“Well, I’ll need _something_ to go off of if you insist on coming to me with this tripe. Who is it? Who is so fucking special that you’d be willing to toss your perfect little love story out with the rubbish for them?”

“She’s an old acquaintance, that’s all,” Cullen sighs, short on patience for these trivialities. “We happened to reconnect recently, after many years.”

“I’ll bet you did. Over and over an-”

“Shut _up!_ ” Cullen growls. “You don’t get to talk about her like that, either.”

Samson merely rolls his eyes. “Fine, fine. You love her, then?”

“I-” Cullen starts, suddenly stalling. Such a simple question, isn’t it? Stunningly obvious. Shouldn’t it be?

“Come on. If it’s only some meaningless fling, then you _definitely_ picked the wrong man to bring all this to.” Samson crosses his arms and smiles broadly, teeth stained and jagged behind cracked lips. “I’m a romantic, remember?”

Cullen wishes he had it in him to laugh right back in Samson’s face at that, but it won’t come.

“I told her I did, once,” is the best answer he can manage right away. “It felt like I meant it at the time, but…”

“Buyer’s remorse. Happens to the best of men, which we certainly aren’t.”

“It’s complicated,” is Cullen’s painful cliché of a reply, terse and pinched.

“So uncomplicate it. You either love her or you love fucking her, which is it?”

“There’s…” Cullen struggles for an answer, groping blindly for a way to convey a meaning that’s always felt formless and intangible, at least for someone like him. _This_ is why he’s come here tonight, he realizes; an excuse to force himself to put it into words instead of letting it twist soundlessly in his head, to make it _real_ somehow after spending the day since she left wandering the grounds with the passion of a mindless zealot, to voice it with a literal captive audience to prod him along. “We’ve a connection, but it’s not like anything I’ve ever…” Cullen stops, shakes his head, tries again. “I’ve been in love. I _am_ in love, and it’s not that. It’s something else, something I can’t-”

“How do you know?” Samson interrupts, _just_ as he thinks he might be getting somewhere, and Cullen thinks he might actually scream in frustration.

He doesn’t.

“How do I know _what?”_

“That what you felt with other people was love. Perhaps those were — _are_ — all simply infatuations, perhaps this mysterious ‘connection’ you can’t name is the only true thing you’ve known in your whole sad little life. How do you know?”

It’s an appalling thought, one that cheapens the best thing to ever happen to him, and Cullen suspects that Samson only raises it to unnerve. What makes it truly damning, however, is that this isn’t the first time the notion has crossed his mind.

“I can’t accept that,” he says, shaking his head sharply.

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Both,” Cullen snaps, falling back on what he told himself the last time this occurred to him as a possibility. “Love isn’t some grand mystery; people talk about it, write about it, and the first time I felt it, I _got_ it. I understood. Everything finally made sense. This isn’t that. This isn’t like anything I’ve ever even heard _tell_ of, it’s something else. It must be.”

Samson’s lip curls up into a slow sneer. “Well, aren’t you the fucking special one, then? Unless you haven’t heard tell of lust before, but any time in Kirkwall’d cure even the staunchest Chantry priss of that. Storybook romance or fucking around, none of it’s enough for Rutherford, Maker no, he needs something _else_ , something undefinable and deeper than anything as pedestrian as undeserved bliss. Maybe that’d be enough for _most_ people, but not Ser Holier-Than-Thou-Yet-Worse-Than-The-Lot, no, he’s always been special, above-”

“Enough.” Cullen’s voice is quieter now, suddenly tired, but Samson ends off his diatribe as if Cullen had barked the command. Point made, he supposes. “That’s enough.”

Enough for most people. But not for him.

He’ll have to think on this one for a while.

“What?” Samson blurts out when Cullen turns to leave without another utterance, his steps echoing hollowly throughout the dungeon. “That’s it? Not even a knife in the gut for my troubles?” He raises his voice bit by bit as Cullen makes for the stairs, but never quite enough for his words to get all the way to wrong ears. No, this was all for the two of them and them alone. “Why’d you even come here? Got it off your chest, aye, but strike me down if I got the chance to say anything you didn’t already know. And while I certainly appreciate getting some of the local gossip, you were always a piece of shit. No grand revelations on either end, here. You know, if you leave your women this unsatisfied, you’ll have to find more than two!”

It continues as Cullen heads back up the stairs to sunlight, but he's got other things on his mind now.

***

It takes him four hundred and twenty-eight steps to get back to his office, and he doesn’t leave for the rest of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick little side piece because it's been so long without an update, and the next chapter is a long one! 2017, huh? Wild. In retrospect, I wish I'd pushed to have it done for Valentine's Day, because yes, Cullen and Surana's not-a-date night is coming up next~


	18. Nice Idea, Poor Execution (Part One)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cullen. Surana. Definitely not a date. Definitely. Part 1 of 2. Rating: E

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been five months, and for once, I feel like my excuses for not writing are pretty good ones, but that's neither here nor there. I'm just glad to be back. Onwards!

Her knock comes long minutes after the appointed time has elapsed, and as Cullen rises to his feet and walks to a door other than the one he’s been expecting her to arrive at, he has to wonder if this is a sign of indecision on her part, or merely simple tardiness. He had to talk her into this, he knows, and while he’s grateful that she came around, he’d be remiss if he forgot that she might not still be entirely comfortable meeting like this.

If he’s honest (and isn’t that always the goal, here?), grateful or no, he’s a bit nervous, himself. There’s no real reason to be, Cullen knows, but that hadn’t stopped him from spending the hour since he locked up his office pacing about and trying to decide what to wear. He very nearly remained in his armour, before changing his mind at the last minute and switching to his usual fare for meeting Neria. Simple brown shirt and slacks, clean but comfortable, plain but presentable. Perhaps he’ll feel a bit odd if she shows up in _her_ armour, but less so than he would if she changed and he didn’t. Besides, it’s _his_ office, after all, some degree of casualness outside of usual working hours is to be expected.

Even so, he continues the debate internally right up until she arrives and saves him from himself. Somehow, given all the myriad things about this that are worth his concern, that it could be anyone but her at his door never even registers as a possibility, even with the lateness and unexpected approach. He just knows better.

She knocks again, quicker this time though still light, a series of fluttery strikes muffled by the thick wood, and Cullen realizes with a start that he’s just been standing in front of the door like a fool for some time.

And if he’s _still_ being honest, he knows that his hesitation isn’t solely due to nerves.

Even so, he clears his throat, smooths his hair, and opens the door so Neria can slip in, small and quick, like one of the nighttime shadows sneaking inside to hide in the corners of his room.

“Was starting to think you went to bed without me,” she teases lightly while he re-locks the door behind her. Instead of pointing out that that’s ultimately what’s going to happen anyway, Cullen focuses on more immediate matters.

“Did anyone see you?”

“Not a soul,” she assures him with a smile and only a hint of exasperation as she rises on her toes to kiss him.

“You’re sure,” he pushes even as he winds his arms around her waist and pulls her into an embrace. She hasn’t technically changed for the evening, but nor has she come clad for a fight. She wears her underclothes; thick, soft linen worn down wherever the straps and buckles from her armour lay across her body by day. If feels strangely intimate, seeing her like this, somehow even more so than when she greets him in sheer robes through which he can make out everything.

Perhaps because it’s evident that this is really _her_ when stripped down. There’s no hint of artifice or show here.

“Positive,” and she’s warm to the touch and sweet to the taste, and it just feels all too good to be wrong. “Believe it or not, I can be quite sneaky when I want to be.”

“Oh, I believe it,” Cullen hums before pulling away from her with only some regret. He hasn’t asked her here for physical comforts, and he gestures to his desk, where two chairs sit on opposite sides. “It that why you’re late? Making certain?”

“No, that was just to keep things interesting,” she replies, light and airy and flashing him a smile over her shoulder as she approaches the desk. It’s all just a _bit_ too much, and just like that, Cullen knows that he wasn’t the only nervous one.

“Mission accomplished,” he chuckles, watching her carefully as she takes in the extra tapers he thought to light, the cloth-covered tray of food he’d had sent up in advance. She idly trails her fingertips along the desk’s edge, lingering while Cullen takes a seat and tries not to seem too expectant. “Well?”

“Well what?” she asks, seemingly unconcerned as she traces the patterns of knotwork that Cullen knows as well as any map that’s ever crossed them.

“Aren’t you going to sit down?”

“I only see one bottle of wine,” is her non-reply. She clucks her tongue disapprovingly, shaking her head, and Cullen grins, a little incredulous before he reaches down into one of his side drawers to pull out the second.

“I thought it would be proper to wait until the first was actually finished.”

Her face lights up for the briefest of moments, a light laugh emerging, and Cullen desperately wishes he was in the right mood to appreciate it.

“I never should have doubted you,” she says, before picking up the heavy wooden chair like it was nothing, hauling it around to Cullen’s side of the desk, and finally sitting down. “But are we really concerning ourselves overmuch with propriety? This isn’t a job interview.”

“You… may have a point there, I’ll admit,” he replies, only slightly put out. He was trying to keep an air of respectability to the proceedings, but there really is nothing about them together worth respecting. It would be like putting clothes on a nug.

“I usually do. But what about you?”

“Me?”

“I presume you had a point in asking me here tonight, in making such a fuss about it. Am I wrong?”

“Not… wrong, no,” Cullen says, hedging slightly. “But if you’re waiting for some other shoe to drop, you can stop. This is all there is.” Reaching out, he pulls the cloth from the tray of food, stew and fruit and crusty white bread, silently praying that he’ll be able to keep his mind focused enough to prevent his assurances from becoming a lie. “Now eat, while it’s still warm. I could only ask for so much without raising suspicions, but there should be enough for two as long as neither of us are exceedingly ravenous.”

Neria hesitates only briefly before smiling and giving a small nod of relieved acquiescence, though she does go for the wine before anything else. It’s an Antivan vintage, heady but sweet, and while Cullen is no connoisseur, he knows that it’s a notable enough year that it must be at least decent. If nothing else, it gets the job done, even mightily out of place as it is in the metal cups he uses.

They eat. They drink. Cullen tells Neria about his day (with only one significant omission), and while she doesn’t seem overly invested in it, she at least nods her way pleasantly through, humouring him. When she does the same, alcohol loosening her tongue enough for idle chat about missed correspondences and meetings with Inquisition spies and walks down to the camps in the valley to meet his men, Cullen struggles to find any small scrap of meaning in her words, some new piece of information to make it all worth it. In this, he’s destined to fail.

It’s not enough. How could this ever be enough, be _worth it_ on any conceivable level?

“Cullen?”

“Hmm?”

His eyes refocus suddenly from where he’d been staring at the empty dishes, and he sees Neria smirking at him. Did he miss a joke?

“Look at you, you’re a hundred leagues away. Are you always this distracted by a little extra stimulation and I just never noticed before? Or do you get sleepy when you eat too fast?”

Cullen feels a flush creeping up his neck, some combination of embarrassment and annoyance causing him to duck his head.

“Overstimulation is hardly the problem,” he replies, harsher than he intends, and he sees Neria sit up from where she’d previously been leaning comfortably forward in her seat.

“Wow, fuck you, too.” He makes a face, instantly regretful, but at least she’s still smiling even if there’s a curious bent to it now. “I’ll endeavour to be more engaging in the future.”

“That’s not what I-” Cullen begins to amend before stopping and sighing. He can’t even be bothered. “You’re not the problem, here.”

“So there’s a problem.”

“No!” he lies, shaking his head and immediately softening his tone when her smile begins to slip, gives way to concern. “It’s nothing. Nothing new, anyway, just forget it.”

She clearly sees through him but elects to say nothing as Cullen moves to open the second bottle of Antivan red and refill her drink, because they’ve somehow already burned through the first. She doesn’t give him the satisfaction, however, smoothly reaching out and taking the bottle from him the instant he prises out the cork.

Fingers brush, gentle and deliberate, before she raises the bottle to her lips, eschewing a mug entirely. Cullen lets his eyes wander, as is clearly her playful intention, drinking in the motion of her throat working as surely as she takes in the wine. Her lips wrap around that of the bottle, fetchingly filthy, and there’s a rather lewd popping noise when she eventually lets up, her wine-stained tongue sneaking out between dark lips to catch a stray drop with a wink.

She’s trying, bless her, but his heart just isn’t in it, and her expression falls after another moment of non-response.

“You’re making me feel a fool. What is it?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he sighs, and he’s honestly not sure if it’s a lie anymore or not. “Tell me something.”

“Okay.”

“Nothing in particular, just… What’s wrong isn’t anything that will be fixed by talking about it. So tell me something about yourself, instead.” If he can just make himself remember why he wanted her here in the first place…

“Nothing in particular? Cullen, you know I’m an open book.” A substance-free response, but her tone is open, welcoming in spite of that. Either she’s being extremely receptive to his moods, or she’s simply drunk and fed and happy for it. Either option helps, and it could very well be a measure of both, anyway.

“I know you like to _say_ that,” he counters, and while she rolls her eyes, it seems fond. The natural rhythms of banter are something he’s capable of maintaining, at least.

“Are you calling me a liar?”

 _”Certainly_ not.”

He shouldn’t be able to laugh at the shared history the exchange calls to mind even on a good day, but a chuckle slips past his lips nonetheless, dark but genuine.

“Good.” She takes another long pull from the bottle, and before Cullen knows it, he’s giving her something to work with in regards to his previous request.

“Do you ever think about me? When we’re not together?”

“Do I…” Neria begins with a curious smile, looking for all the world as if she’s going to dismiss the question out of hand before thinking better of it. “No, not really.”

“Oh.” He’s not sure what he expected.

“Sometimes?” she quickly ventures, and Cullen assumes his face must have fallen, drink stripping him of his abilities to mask his immediate reactions. “Not often, but… not never, either?” Why she should endeavour to preserve his feelings after crushing them beneath the boot of her brutal honesty is beyond him, but it’s oddly endearing in its way. Caring without _really_ caring.

 _Oh, there’s nothing brutal about it, you idiot, you’re the one who asked a stupid question._ It isn’t her fault that there’s nothing sentimental about their truths, and truth is _how_ she cares.

“No, I understand,” he assures her, eyes cast down before he reaches out to take the bottle himself, though he doesn’t drink from it just yet. Fingers brush once more, but he makes no show of it. “I think… I think I’m the same way.”

“You don’t think about yourself when we’re not together, either?” Still teasing, still trying, still easy, too fucking easy by far.

“You know what I mean.”

“I do, and I get it, so stop pouting just because I don’t pine for you. We’ve both got bigger concerns.”

“I am _not_ — That’s not why— Obviously, I think about you sometimes, I don’t forget you exist when I’m not looking at you.”

“Maybe it would be easier if you did,” she offers with a shrug, and Cullen finally gives in, raising the bottle to his lips.

“Maybe.” He drinks, and he doesn’t like that it helps.

He catches a hint of a flicker of a remnant of an emotion as he sets the bottle back down, some brief bit of insecurity crossing her face, and Cullen both loves and hates that he can make her feel like that.

That he could make _her_ , of all people, do anything.

“In lieu of that being an option…” she begins again, not quite as flirtatious and easy as before, but still pushing. “How _do_ you think of me? When you’re alone, that is. Anything good? Bad? Dirty?” She bends down to idly pull her boots off as she talks, making herself right at home in a way that would chafe were he sober, pushing herself blithely past all the flimsy barriers he leans so heavily against.

“Are you asking if I fantasize about you?” he asks, cutting through her little dance of innuendo while his head is still pleasantly spinning.

She shrugs. “I guess I was hoping for more than a simple yes or no, but…” When Cullen doesn’t immediately pick up and run with her hanging insinuation, however, her mood dims. “But maybe I was just taking that ‘yes’ for granted.”

 _Maybe you were,_ he doesn’t say, because it’s so pointlessly cruel and she is trying _so fucking hard_ to salvage the night. Besides, he’s had enough of maybes.

“Not necessarily,” he says instead, slouching back in his chair in a way that would surely appall his men. Surana deserves so much more than the breadcrumbs of affection he can muster tonight, but she willingly receives them, anyway.

“Oh?” she prompts him, leaning forward.

“I don’t make it a habit to… _dwell_ on such things, but occasionally I’ll find myself remembering.”

“What sort of things?”

“Times we’ve been together. Better?”

“Much. Which times?” Maker knows that some have been much better than others, and Cullen doesn’t have to even think about what his go-to might be.

“The Approach. The second time, after all the fighting and arguing and… hurting was done with, and it was just you and me and night air.” Cullen sighs at the memory, still vivid from the occasional recollection, and lets his head loll back against his chair. “You were riding me and the wind was in your hair and all of this was so far away it felt like a dream. Maker, but I miss that feeling.”

He doesn’t recall closing his eyes, but he finds himself opening them nevertheless, to see Neria watching him with her own eyes wide.

“Sorry,” he says with a sideways slur of a smile. “Guess that wasn’t about sex so much as…”

It’s never _really_ been about sex for them, though, has it? Or is that _all_ it’s been about? He can’t remember.

“No apologies, remember?” she cuts him off, but there’s something sad in it. “What’s wrong, Cullen?”

“I told you, nothing that-”

“Nothing that I can help, that’s fine, but it feels like you don’t even really want me here and I came here for _you._ So… tell me I didn’t make a mistake doing that.”

He can’t. Not when his greatest fantasy at the moment is simply to be able to forget another woman for a little while.

“It’s our anniversary today.”

He tries to muster up a surprised reaction to his confession (he really hadn’t meant to say it, it just slipped out), but all he can manage is resignation. He’s feeling far too burned out for more strenuous emotions.

“What?”

“Ellana and I, we’ve been together one year today.” For a given value of the word ‘together’, of course. “I didn’t remember, never even thought to take note of the date. The only reason I even know is because she left a letter, delivered this morning because she knew we’d be apart for it.” He sighs, bows his head before reaching into the top drawer of his desk to pull out the letter in question and toss it on top, already creased and worn from reading and rereading, turning it over between tense fingers. Plain paper, smudged ink, but heartfelt words that would mean the world to him if they weren’t first making him feel like a monster.

“Oh, Cullen,” Neria breathes, and he tentatively raises his eyes to catch her reaction. He expects anger, or hurt at the reveal that he’s been thinking of another this entire time, but all he sees is… sympathy? “Why didn’t you say anything? We didn’t have to do this tonight.”

“When, then?” he asks, genuinely confused. “Your next visit? I already had to work to convince you that this was a good idea in the first place, would you honestly have consented to postponing at the last possible minute? I didn’t think I could bring you around on the notion all over again.”

She shakes her head before rising, walking over to him with the deliberate steps of the drunk. “You wouldn’t have had to. You got me, Cullen, you convinced me, you wouldn’t have to do it again.” She comes around the back of his chair, but bends over before he can turn to face her, pressing a kiss to his cheek from behind. “I’ll go, and… we’ll do this again, okay? On a better night, next time, we… we’ll do it ri-”

She doesn’t get to finish her thought before Cullen grabs her and pulls her back around, yanks her down into his lap. “No,” is all he grunts out before he presses his mouth to hers, hard and silencing.

He was wrong. He should have known that when he saw how accommodating she was being from the very beginning, but even then it would have been too late to salvage things. The day would have already been tainted by betrayal, and Neria making any sort of exit now won’t fix that. So when she proposes leaving, Cullen’s jumbled thoughts only come to one desperate conclusion: that making something of his time with Neria is the only possible method he has left to him to honour his relationship with Ellana.

Even for him, it’s a stretch, he’ll admit.

But if he sends her away now, the whole exercise will have been a waste _and_ he’ll have cheated, anyway. On today of all days. If he keeps going, presses the issue, he might yet gain something of worth. It will always be wrong, but that’s better than being wrong _and_ utterly without point, isn’t it?

Isn’t it?

Neria doesn’t seem to disagree, anyway, kissing him back after a few long moments of uncertainty, and he wraps his arms around her as she shifts in his lap until she can straddle him.

Actual arousal is slow to come, Cullen’s body not particularly keen to respond in a rush against the twin opponents of the alcohol in his system and the churn of guilt that his thoughts remain, but the squirming bundle of elf and woman and warden and witch in his lap won’t be denied forever. She rocks against him as he maps out her mouth with his tongue, the grind of her hips slow but firm until an erection can’t help but meet it. Even then, though, Neria hesitates as she reaches too-clever-by-far fingers between them to undo his trousers, slowing her motions.

“You’re sure you want this?” she asks, and he’ll have to weigh the matter further later, but Cullen _thinks_ that might be the first time she’s ever asked him such a thing. He doesn’t answer her, either way, just covers her hands with his own, goads her onward and kisses her that much harder. He _can’t_ answer her, not right now, because he opened his eyes for the briefest of seconds, there, and the glimpse of his office, his space, in these circumstances is almost enough to make him nauseous. All he can think about is Ellana, of biting his lip while she’d sink to her knees in front of the very chair he sits in, of sweeping away his clutter and taking her on his desk, of all the nights she had to coax him up the ladder to his bed, the promise of her love and curling up by her side being the only thing that could possibly be worth setting aside his work.

Neria’s just got his cock out when he can’t take it anymore. He can’t do this here, amidst familiar surroundings made grotesque by her very presence, but since taking her to his bed is emphatically _not_ an option for the very same reasons, he attempts something a bit simpler. He stands up swiftly, her gasp of surprise fading as he holds her firmly about the thighs and lifts her with him. He doesn’t go far, just a few steps before he lowers them both to the floor, keeping her on top of him as he stretches out onto the thin rug below.

“The floor?” she skeptically asks, raising an eyebrow. “That can’t be comfortable for you, Cullen.”

Again, he doesn’t answer her. He’s not here for comfort. He’s here for truth, and release, and the slight change in perspective from what he’s used to is just enough to twist his own quarters into something new, still familiar but skewed enough to be completely different at the same time. At the very least, it no longer makes him want to retch to see Surana gasping and groaning in such a place, and an aching back will be a small price to pay in the long run.

He tries not to seem frantic as he pushes her own trousers and smalls down her hips just far enough to be able to slide into her, and he doesn’t know how successful he is, but he’s also quickly beyond caring as she tips her head back and moans, high and reedy as she presses herself down onto him.

“Sssh,” he stiltedly reminds her, and she nods quickly in between slight rises of her body. She can get loud, but he trusts her not to give the game away when it counts. Even so, it’s worth remembering just where they are in comparison to the relative isolation of Skyhold’s guest quarters that they usual dally in.

They rut like that for a long while, small thrusts while the cold bleeds up from the stone floor to settle into his bones, Neria’s hands against his chest seemingly trying to counter it from the other side, and Cullen knows it’s going to be one of those nights where he takes fucking forever to get off. Perhaps she senses it, too, because she eventually gets fed up with fucking fully clothed, her pants tangled awkwardly about her thighs, and climbs off of him to undress properly.

Her legs are clearly wobbly, and Cullen sits up a bit to rest a supportive hand against her calf as she quickly strips, but he’s impatient to get back to it, and only kicks his own trousers a bit further down his legs before she lowers herself back onto his cock, her bare back to him this time around. Freed from her underarmour, she fucks him in earnest now, driving herself down hard around him and leaving him breathless with every slap of her skin.

The view is… intoxicating, to say the least, and perhaps he needn’t have worried about his surroundings so much. He can’t tear his eyes away from the way her arse wobbles with every thrust, at his cock disappearing inside her again and again. They could be absolutely anywhere at the moment and it would make no difference to him. In fact, the uncomfortable stone at his back very well could be that of those ruins out in the desert that so entranced him for that one night, even if the lighting’s all wrong.

Then, of course, she has to go and speak and spoil it all.

“Cullen… say something, please,” she pants out, so quiet it takes him a moment to realize she was even talking. She’s got her back bowed, the line of her spine raised and curving, head down in what looks like concentration from behind, hair falling down around her face while she rests her hands against his legs for support and keeps moving.

“Pardon?”

“This… this wasn’t what you wanted me to come here for. At all. Is this okay?”

Only then does he realize just how his repeated lack of response might have sounded outside of his own mind. Does she think he’s just doing this to keep her here?

“Yes, yes, it’s fine. It’s better than fine, I want this. I don’t want to want it, but I want it. Just… _fuck_ , please don’t stop.”

“I’m not stopping. Just talk to me?”

Maker, if only he knew what she really thinks of him.

“What… what do you want me to say?” His mouth is dry and he wishes he’d brought the remaining wine down to the floor with him, but Neria seems to redouble her efforts at his words, slamming down against his body, sliding all that slick warmth of hers around him so quickly that the thought of moving anywhere but further inside of her is anathema. “I’m not an open book like you, you’ve got to tell me what you want from me.”

She takes so long to respond that Cullen thinks she might have changed her mind, but her soft vocalizations of effort and pleasure both do eventually give way again. “Give me a fantasy. You and me. Not a memory. Make one up if you have to.”

Huh.

“Well… I suppose there is one I sometimes go back to.”

_Huh._

It’s a smart approach, he supposes. At any other time, he’d likely be far too embarrassed to give voice to his most private of thoughts, but it’s rather difficult to have any sense of propriety when one is balls deep in a woman. The words just… come.

“We’re at the Winter Palace, the ball last year.”

“What, in Orlais?” Neria interrupts him, rather annoyingly. “What would I possibly be doing there?”

“I don’t know, it’s a fantasy, there’s not a tremendous amount of internal logic involved, now do you want to — _nnngh_ — hear this or not?” It’s difficult enough to string together full sentences as it is.

“No, I do, keep going, I’ll just… do the same.” She’s amused again, that’s good. He keeps thinking he’s ruined things, brooded and sniped her into heartache and bitter, angry sex, but she keeps surprising him with what she’s willing to put up with.

_Because you don’t matter._

“Maybe you’re there in place of that horrible witch friend of yours, it doesn’t matter. All that matters is you’re there.”

That part isn’t quite true; the venue matters, too, but he can easily leave that bit of context out. He could tell her, and maybe it wouldn’t even matter, but Neria doesn’t need to know that his strongest memories of the place are also his last major memories of being single. Ellana was still happy with another at the time, and Cullen, even as he silently pined for her, would have been free to do as he pleased with anyone. His fantasy is as much about being alone and doing things guilt-free as it is about the star of it.

“You’re there, and I see you from across the ballroom, and we talk, and it’s just like it was the first time you came here, easy and… just _easy_ , like it never could be before.” Except this time, he’d be allowed to do something about it.

“What am I wearing?”

“A gown, something long and utterly impractical that you’d likely never actually wear.”

“Hmm, what colour is it?”

“Maker’s breath, I don’t know… red? All I know is I want to get you out of it as soon as possible.”

“Oh, that’s good.”

“It is, and I do, I will, you’d drag me off by the hand and we’d sneak away like horny teenagers, I suppose I have no duties to perform or reason to actually be there in this world, or maybe I just don’t _care_. You’d pull me into a closet somewhere, or some other dark corner because we haven’t seen each other in so many years and we just can’t _wait_ to get our hands on each other, and…”

“And?” She’s gone breathless, too, but she is, admittedly, exerting herself rather harder than he is at the moment.

“Mmmm, and then it depends on how close I am to finishing, I suppose. Either I’ll just hike up your dress and lay into you until I’m done, fill you up with my seed before the world comes back, or maybe I’ll drop to my knees first, bury my face between your legs like you’ve never actually let me and make you scream so loud half the palace hears because we _don’t care_ —”

She shivers as she comes, body tensing hard above him and only then does Cullen notice she’s been holding herself up one-handed for some time now. He chuckles, low in his throat, gripping her hips tightly and forcing her to keep up the pace because he’s far closer than he thought he’d be so soon.

 

***

 

“That was… nicer than I expected it to be. Your little story, I mean,” she murmurs as she snuggles against his chest.

“Mmm. What were you expecting?”

“I don’t know. It was a bit pedestrian, honestly.”

“As opposed to something darker, then?”

“Not necessarily.” She hesitates, though, averting her gaze like a guilty child.

“Mm-hmm. Would it be better if I’d slapped you, choked you out? Stripped you of your mana and tossed you against a bookcase before having my way with you, then?”

“Cullen, I didn’t say that-”

She moves to get up, but he shushes her, smoothing a hand across her shoulders and ducking his head to kiss her, soft and quick. Even with his lower back screaming at him to get up off the fucking floor already because he’s getting too old for this sort of thing, he’s still too blissfully post-coital to actually get upset by her inadvertent insinuations.

“You were thinking it, though. And maybe you’re not wrong to, given the things I’ve told you, but that wasn’t me. Or… or even if it was, if I am still the sort of man who’d indulge in such… well, then it certainly was never about you, all right? It was someone else, someone who never even existed outside of my own head, not really. And she looked like you and she sounded like you, yes, but she wasn’t _you._ And now I have you, so my fantasies are going to reflect that. I don’t think about you that way. I never did.”

She’s quiet for a beat.

“You don’t have me, Cullen.”

He sighs.

“You’re right. I misspoke. Now you have me.”

Her grip on him tightens. Possessively, or is that just wishful thinking?

What he certainly doesn’t have are any more hollow notions of what constitutes a line he won’t cross.

“Do you want to come up to my loft?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NEXT CHAPTER: Not-a-date night, the conclusion. Even more sex and even more talking, shocking I know!


End file.
